Streeting urges patients to ‘bear with’ GPs as outage sparks major disruption

Health Secretary Wes Streeting has urged people to “bear with” GPs amid a major IT outage that has caused “considerable disruption” to appointment bookings and other services.

Thousands of GP practices have been affected, with NHS England confirming there has been an issue with the EMIS Web system, which is understood to be used by about 60% of practices in England.

There have also been issues with administrative systems in some hospitals while some ambulance services have reported a surge in demand.

The PA news agency understands that around 3,700 GP practices may be affected. People trying to access the NHS app have also encountered problems.

In a post on X, Mr Streeting wrote: “This is having a particular impact on GP appointments and electronic prescribing.

“Please bear with your local GPs if they’re grappling with this on top of normal pressures.

“My department is working closely with colleagues across government.”

A spokesperson for NHS England said: “The NHS has long-standing measures in place to manage the disruption, including using paper patient records and handwritten prescriptions, and the usual phone systems to contact your GP.

“There is currently no known impact on 999 or emergency services, so people should use these services as they usually would.

“There are also some issues with administrative systems in hospitals that mean staff are having to work manually from paper to manage certain tasks but in the majority of hospitals, care is continuing as normal.

“Patients should attend appointments unless told otherwise. Only contact your GP if it’s urgent, and otherwise please use 111 online or call 111.”

GP surgeries reported issues with accessing patient records or booking appointments because of the outage.

Outages like this affect our access to important clinical information about our patients, as well as our ability to book tests, make referrals, and inform the most appropriate treatment plan

Pharmacies also reported issues with accessing prescriptions from GP surgeries and said this would affect the delivery of medicines to patients.

Professor Kamila Hawthorne, chairwoman of the Royal College of GPs , said: “Our members are telling us that today’s outage is causing considerable disruption to GP practice bookings and IT systems – practices using EMIS IT systems appear to be particularly affected.

“Outages like this affect our access to important clinical information about our patients, as well as our ability to book tests, make referrals, and inform the most appropriate treatment plan.

“GPs and their practice teams will do what they can to minimise the impact on patients, working hard to ensure they still get the care they need wherever possible.

“We urge all patients to please bear with us and if their issue isn’t urgent then to try and wait until the outage has been resolved.”

EMIS Web is the most widely used clinical system for primary care in the UK.

It enables GP practices to book appointments, examine records and includes a clinical decision support tool as well as helping with admin.

Following the outage, Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust declared a critical incident due to disruption to its radiotherapy services.

It contacted patients who were due to have treatment on Friday morning to reschedule.

A statement on its website said the hospital is “now able to deliver radiotherapy services and this afternoon’s appointments will take place as scheduled”.

However, it warned the disruption could affect appointments into next week.

A spokesperson for Salisbury District Hospital, which has also been affected, told PA: “The challenge is around our patient administration system. It means that we’ve gone to manual registration of new patients.

“This is in the emergency, maternity and other front door services where people present directly at the hospital. That process is now slow rather than being digital.

“The outage hasn’t impacted outpatients with appointments running as normal.

“One of the systems is the system used for rostering staff, which is done six weeks in advance, so we’re not seeing any staff shortages at the moment.

“However, we’re using paper systems to allocate cover.”

As the GP appointment system is down, more patients are being referred to pharmacies for minor ailments

In another post on X, formerly Twitter, Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust said the outage “has affected some of our systems which is impacting some clinical services”.

West Herts Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, which includes Watford General, Hemel Hempstead & St Albans City Hospitals, said the impact on their services has been “minor”.

South Central Ambulance Service said it was experiencing increased demand on its 999 and NHS 111 services.

In a post on X, it said: “As usual, our 999 team will be prioritising patients in a serious or life-threatening condition.

“Patients not requiring such an immediate response may have to wait longer than usual to be seen by our ambulance team.”

The chief executive of London Ambulance Service also said crews have been “incredibly busy”.

Daniel Elkeles added: “In fact, by 2pm today, we had received more than 3,000 999 calls and 3,000 calls to our 111 services – this is a third higher than we would usually receive in a full 24 hour period.

“Our teams are always here to help if you need us and we encourage anyone who needs our services to continue to contact us.

“We are working very hard to make sure we are getting to patients as quickly as possible, but please be aware that our response times today may be impacted by this global issue.”

A spokesman for the National Pharmacy Association said pharmacies have also been affected.

He said: “We’re aware that due to global IT outages that services in community pharmacies, including the accessing of prescriptions from GPs and medicine deliveries, are disrupted today. We urge patients to be patient whilst visiting their pharmacy.

Patients with “minor ailments” are also being sent to pharmacies from GP surgeries, according to the chief executive of the the Independent Pharmacies Association (IPA).

Dr Leyla Hannbeck said: “Pharmacies are experiencing delays in prescriptions arriving through (the) GP system as the systems are down, and there are also delays in receiving medicines in stock due to some wholesalers experiencing IT system failures.

“As the GP appointment system is down, more patients are being referred to pharmacies for minor ailments.”

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