With the rising population number and age, and the current financial climate of the NHS, there is a greater burden on primary care services to create innovative solutions to meet the increasing patient demand. Alternative communication tools such as telephone triage have been proposed by the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) as a cost-effective, sustainable solution. The quality of the first patient interaction, typically conducted by receptionists, can have a substantial impact on patient care, yet most are not trained in medical communication. This project aimed to improve the telephone triage process at our practice (South Lambeth Road Practice) focusing specifically on the patient’s first contact with receptionists as this is a potential area of significant risk. The involvement of a final year medical student in a leadership role was a novel aspect of this project that served as an invaluable link between medical and non-medical staff.

A protocol entitled ‘SLRP’ (Symptoms, Length of symptoms, Recent actions, Priority) was created to aid reception staff with focused information gathering and effective triage. Patient awareness was also increased by updating the practice website, phone service and production of posters.

Before telephone triage, 100% of calls resulted in face-to-face consultations, compared to 45% after its implementation. Post-intervention there was a 142% rise in the quality of information gathered. Feedback from staff showed the protocol increased their confidence when interacting with and gathering information from patients.

This project has resulted in the implementation of further telephone triage days and interactive training sessions for receptionists. It highlighted the challenges faced by receptionists and has emphasised that effective leadership involves the ability to work collaboratively with non-medical and medical staff to create sustained improvement.