Practice manager partners could be the key to the future survival of GP practices, research has found.
Smaller GP practices that appoint a manager partner are significantly less likely to close or merge, says a study – the first of its kind – published in the Journal of Health Economics.
And researchers from the University of Manchester and Calgary found that appointing a practice manager partner leads to a number of benefits including significant increases in full-time equivalent (FTE) direct patient care staff, (excluding GPs and nurses) as well as administrative staff numbers and total patient list size.
Crucially, income from non-core services, such as local or direct enhanced services, QOF, and medication administration payments, were also found to be higher following the hiring of a practice manager as a partner.
At the same time there was also no significant affect on numbers of GP or nurse staff, GP turnover, quality of care, patients’ satisfaction and access.
In addition, the study has pointed out that bringing in non-clinical manager partners can help ease the financial and managerial burden of running a practice on GP partners, whose numbers are dwindling and who are at risk of burnout and stress.
To uncover the impact of non-clinical ownership on key primary care outcomes, researchers analysed data from 37,660 practice financial years from 5,026 GP surgeries in England between 2015 and 2023. They also a looked at a range of other information sources such as general practice patient lists, workforce records, payment records to general practices and disease prevalence registers.
Results revealed that although in 2015 there were no manager partners by 2022 there were 335 – serving 7% of patients registered at practices in England.
Practices that appoint a manager partner were found to be more sustainable because they were less likely to subsequently merge or close. the researchers found.
Co-author Dr Ben walker from the University of Calgary, Canada, said that the skillset of practice manager partners can bring important benefits.
‘The increase in direct patient care staff in practices that appoint manager partners could be indicative of the manager’s efforts to improve the organisational efficiency and performance of the practice’, he said
“With expertise in business planning, they may be better placed and more incentivised to maximise income, leaving more time for GPs to concentrate ion patient care and even potentially slowing the decline in GP partner retention.
‘But also, manager partners’ skills in HR and financial planning may improve staff organisation and recruitment.’
The research concludes that practice managers having ownership in practices could provide a sustainable alternative structure for general practice.
Co-author Dr Sean Urwin from The University of Manchester, said: ‘As the number of GP partners continues to decrease, the managerial and financial burden of operating a practice is placed upon an increasingly smaller number of GPs.
‘While not a like-for-like substitute for GPs, we argue that non-GP partners can alleviate some partnership burdens and offer additional managerial skills.
‘Our analysis also indicates that manager partners offer a potential route for smaller practices to retain their independence rather than being integrated into larger organisations.’
