Page 34 - Primary Care Audiology

An integrated primary care audiology service, therefore, has the
potential to reduce false positive referrals to ENT, a speciality that
already makes up more than 4% of all first outpatient attendances
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and is seeing new referrals growing on average 3.7% per year.
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There are also opportunities to go further in the future by
supporting better IT connectivity between audiologists working
in primary care, GPs, and audiology and ENT departments in
hospitals. This will allow the remote transfer of diagnostic data,
including video otoscopy and images, and enable more needs to
be met in primary care audiology, reducing the need for patients to
attend hospitals for face-to-face appointments.

This will free up more capacity and help GPs and ENT departments
focus on patients who would benefit most from medical care without
the long waits and system pressures they currently experience.

Integrated primary and secondary care –
feasibility study

A feasibility study assessed the benefits of using technology to
reduce hospital referrals.

Patients attended an NCHA member practice in a primary
care setting, where an audiologist conducted an audiological
assessment and used a smartphone-based application and
otoscope to capture images and video of eardrums.

The member sent diagnostic
data to ENT for remote review.
65% of patients avoided a
hospital visit. 98% of patients
were satisfied with the pathway.

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Source: BMJ Open Quality

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