Analysis of Planning, Implementation and Management of a PDS scheme

Study Objective: To identify how personnel from the Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham Primary Care Trusts perceived the processes of planning, implementing and managing a PDS. Methods: A series of 29 in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted by experienced researchers and the method of content analysis used to explore the data. Fourteen participants were derived from within the commissioning body and 15 from the 5 PDS practices. Results: The findings were summarised as a series of themes which were common to both the management interviewees (MI) and the practice based dental teams (PBDT). However the perspectives that each of these groups took to most of the individual themes differed. For the Quality of Care theme, MI felt that there had been inadequate performance monitoring whilst PBDT considered the standard of treatment to be higher as a consequence of not being constrained by time. For the Health Promotion theme, MI felt that it had not been internalised in the practices, whereas PBDT considered the key health promotion benefits to come from the greater time spent with patients providing advice. MI considered the capitation model to be underdeveloped with respect to the development of objectives and financial reconciliation but the PBDT appreciated the financial stability aspect of the model. Conclusion: Perceptions of the PDS scheme varied between stakeholder groups. For the commissioning body themes of evaluation and probity were important, for the practices, PDS allowed a more patient centred approach to treatment. This study was funded by Southwark Primary Care Trust who are the host commissioners across the three PCTs.