The Power of Communication in NHS Primary Care

The Power of Communication in NHS Primary Care

Robert Frost once wrote that half the world has something to say and cannot and the other half has nothing to say and keeps on saying it. Anyone who has worked in a GP practice will recognise the truth in that immediately.

I worked in NHS GP practice administration before joining NovaHS and in that time the one thing that consistently made the biggest difference to how well a practice functions, for patients and for staff, was not technology or process or resource. It was communication.

What good communication actually does in a GP practice

Communication in primary care is often described as a clinical skill, something that happens between a GP and a patient in a consulting room. But in practice it runs through everything. It is the referral that arrives with the right information at the right time. It is the letter that is clear enough that the receiving clinician does not need to phone for clarification. It is the patient who leaves a consultation understanding what happens next and why.

Research published in BMC Medicine in February 2026, drawing on a systematic review of evidence from general practice, confirmed that effective communication in primary care supports better informed decision-making, higher treatment adherence and improved patient outcomes. It also found that good communication is associated with a reduced likelihood of complaints and clinical negligence claims. These are not abstract benefits. They translate directly into a practice that runs more smoothly and patients who feel genuinely cared for.

Why it matters more than ever right now

The context in which GP practices are operating has never been more demanding. The average GP practice in England now serves 2,203 patients per full-time equivalent GP as of March 2026, with approximately 411 million appointments booked in the twelve months to March 2026 (BMA, 2026). A 2024 BMA poll of nearly 3,200 GP registrars found that 72.9 per cent experienced burnout and stress as a direct result of their workload. The SoMEP Workplace Experiences 2025 Report found that 44 per cent of GPs cite workload as their biggest struggle.

In that environment every administrative process that runs smoothly is time and capacity returned to clinical care. Clear, well-structured communication between a practice and its partners, its patients and its own team is one of the most practical ways to protect that capacity.

Communication between a practice and its partners

One dimension of communication that does not always get the attention it deserves is the relationship between a GP practice and the external services it relies on. Whether that is a clinical correspondence service, a pharmacy partner or a clinical support provider, the quality of communication in that relationship has a direct effect on what happens inside the practice.

In my role at NovaHS, our administrative team is the primary point of contact for every practice we work with. That means we are often the bridge between what a practice needs and what our clinical and operational teams deliver. Getting that communication right, being clear, being responsive and making sure nothing gets lost between teams, is something we take seriously because we know from experience what it means when it goes well and what it costs when it does not.

What practice teams tell us matters most

Across the practices we support, the feedback that comes back most consistently is not about any single service feature. It is about feeling heard and kept informed. Practices want to know that when they raise something it will be acted on, that they will be told when something changes and that they do not have to chase for updates.

That is a straightforward standard to describe. It is less straightforward to deliver consistently, particularly across 32 ICB areas and a wide range of practice sizes and structures. But it is the standard we hold ourselves to because we know it is the one that matters most to the people we work with.

Communication as a foundation not a feature

Nova Healthcare Solutions is a CQC-registered healthcare services provider. Our services including NovaDoc, NovaClinic and NovaMed are built around the correspondence, clinical support and documentation workflows that keep GP practices running. Good communication is not a layer we add on top of those services. It is the foundation they are built on.

If you would like to find out more about how we work with GP practices we would be happy to have a conversation.

Devinia Patel is Admin Manager at Nova Healthcare Solutions, where she has worked for over four years. Prior to joining NovaHS, Devinia worked in NHS GP practice administration.

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