The Modality Partnership is a large GP partnership formed in 2009. Such large practices are often described as a "super partnership". According to the
King's Fund in 2016 it was one of England’s largest super-practices. In 2018 it had about 400,000 patients and was thought to be the largest practice in England.
Recognition
The partnership is given a favourable mention in the NHS
Five Year Forward View
The Five Year Forward View was produced by NHS England in October 2014 under the leadership of Simon Stevens as a planning document.
Publication and reception
It received praise for brevity, being only 39 pages, and lacking the illustrations wh ...
. It already conducts 80% of consultations remotely using phone or
Skype
Skype () is a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for VoIP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also has instant messaging, file transfer, deb ...
.
Sarb Basi, the managing director, said in response to the NHS
Five Year Forward View
The Five Year Forward View was produced by NHS England in October 2014 under the leadership of Simon Stevens as a planning document.
Publication and reception
It received praise for brevity, being only 39 pages, and lacking the illustrations wh ...
that it would be a “natural, logical progression” to manage capitated budgets for health and social care budgets through an integrated care organisation, building a "coherent strategic partnership" with an acute hospital and working with
community health trust
As part of the English NHS programme of separating the provision of services from commissioning known as Transforming Community Services a number of community health trusts were established when these services were separated from primary care tru ...
s to incorporate nursing and therapy services. This appeared to connect with comments made by
Simon Stevens to the House of Commons health select committee in October 2014 that he envisaged in Birmingham two large groupings of GPs - the Vitality Partnership and another which would employ geriatricians.
It is suggested that under
Simon Stevens' plan large primary care organisations like Modality could be in a position to challenge the dominance of NHS
hospital trust
A hospital trust, also known as an acute trust, is an NHS trust that provides secondary health services within the English National Health Service and, until they were abolished, in NHS Wales. Hospital trusts were commissioned to provide these s ...
s It has extended the primary care services to include urology, dermatology, rheumatology and x-rays.
David Cameron cited the partnership in May 2015 when he praised Birmingham's transformation of primary care.
It signed an agreement with
Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust
Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust is one of the largest National Health Service teaching Trusts in England and comprises Sandwell General Hospital in West Bromwich, City Hospital, Birmingham and Rowley Regis Hospital. The trust was establi ...
in November 2017 which was a “commitment to work collaboratively over the next three to five years with a view to forming a much more vertically integrated relationship”.
Nick Harding, one of the co-founders, and chair of Sandwell and West Birmingham
Clinical Commissioning Group
Clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) were NHS organisations set up by the Health and Social Care Act 2012 to organise the delivery of NHS services in each of their local areas in England. On 1 July 2022 they were abolished and replaced by Integ ...
was reckoned by the
Health Service Journal to be the 47th most influential person in the English NHS in 2015.
Expansion
In April 2017 it took over four more GP practices in Hull, with 48,000 patients, bringing its total list to 150,000. In June 2017 it took on
Wokingham
Wokingham is a market town in Berkshire, England, west of London, southeast of Reading, north of Camberley and west of Bracknell.
History
Wokingham means 'Wocca's people's home'. Wocca was apparently a Saxon chieftain who may ...
Medical Centre, its 27th practice, with 20,000 patients. In September 2017 it took over six GP practices in
Airedale
Airedale is a geographic area in Yorkshire, England, corresponding to the river valley or dale of the River Aire.
The valley stretches from the river's origin in Aire Head Springs, Malham which is in the Yorkshire Dales, down past Skipton on ...
,
Wharfedale
Wharfedale ( ) is the valley of the upper parts of the River Wharfe and one of the Yorkshire Dales. It is situated within the districts of Craven and Harrogate in North Yorkshire, and the cities of Leeds and Bradford in West Yorkshire. It i ...
and
Craven, bringing its list to more than 200,000 patients. It took over three practices based in
Lewisham
Lewisham () is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in the London Plan as one of ...
in July 2018.
The partnership started to offer online consultations using
Push Doctor
Push Doctor was the UK's first platform to offer video consultations with patients online and via smartphone. It is a GP provider and remote consultation enabler in the UK with a reach of 5.4 million patients. Push Doctor is a NHS-commissioned te ...
to more than 99,000 patients across six of the Modality practices in September 2018. If this is successful it will be extended to all their 400,000 patients.
It proposes to run the bank and back office services for new
primary care network
A Primary care network is a structure which brings general practitioners together on an area basis, possibly with other clinicians, to address chronic disease management and prevention. In 2022 the term is used in England, Singapore and Alberta. ...
s in England which include its practices, and is already doing so in
Walsall
Walsall (, or ; locally ) is a market town and administrative centre in the West Midlands County, England. Historically part of Staffordshire, it is located north-west of Birmingham, east of Wolverhampton and from Lichfield.
Walsall is th ...
.
Performance
It had the largest pay gap between male and female employees (60.7%) of 154 companies based in Birmingham in 2018/19.
In July 2019 it announced it would have to close one of the five GP surgeries it runs in Hull because of staffing difficulties.
After activity surged in the wake of the
COVID-19 pandemic in England the group found that its GPs had an average of nearly 50 patient contacts per day - around double what the
British Medical Association says is the “safety limit". Average time per consultation had risen from 12 minutes in 2020 to 15 minutes in 2021, with a lot more mental health concerns.
References
External links
Modality Partnership
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Health in Birmingham, West Midlands
Health in Yorkshire
General practice organizations
Organisations based in Birmingham, West Midlands
Medical and health organisations based in England