A changing access landscape

The latest GP Patient Survey results give practices another opportunity to understand how patients experience access, appointments, continuity and the care they receive.

There are encouraging signs in the 2026 results. Across several measures, patients are reporting improved experiences of practice websites, appointment waits and whether their needs were met.

However, when the survey results are considered alongside wider operational data, a more complicated landscape emerges.

Using the Haresign.net GP Patient Survey tool, the published 2026 results were analysed alongside online consultation submissions, cloud-based telephony activity and registered list sizes.

The analysis included more than 6,100 GP practices and compared practices according to the number of online consultation submissions they received per 1,000 registered patients.

The headline findings

Online access is now being used very differently across general practice

Practices were divided into five equally sized groups according to their number of online consultation submissions per 1,000 registered patients.

In the lowest-use group, the median practice received approximately eight online submissions per 1,000 patients each month.

In the highest-use group, the median was approximately 254 submissions per 1,000 patients.

This demonstrates how differently digital access is now being used. For some practices, online requests remain a relatively small part of total demand. For others, they have become one of the main routes through which patients contact the practice.

How the lowest and highest online-use practices compare

Figures shown are practice-level medians. Rates are per 1,000 registered patients where applicable.

Online access appears to be displacing some telephone demand

The clearest relationship within the analysis was between online consultation use and telephone demand.

Practices in the lowest online-use group received a median of approximately 628 incoming calls per 1,000 patients.

In the highest-use group, this fell to approximately 411 calls per 1,000 patients.

Across the full dataset, higher online consultation use was strongly associated with fewer telephone calls per patient. The proportion of calls arriving during the morning rush was also lower among practices with greater online use.

But the demand has not necessarily disappeared

When answered telephone calls and online submissions were considered together, practices with the highest online use experienced greater actionable morning demand.

Digital access can make a practice easier to contact, but easier access can also reveal requests that patients may previously have abandoned, postponed or taken elsewhere.

A practice may therefore receive fewer telephone calls while still managing more total contacts.

The operational challenge has moved

The challenge is no longer simply how quickly the practice answers the telephone.

Practices must now safely receive, assess, prioritise, route and complete demand arriving through several different channels.

That creates a different set of operational questions:

• Are all requests entering one coordinated workflow?
• Are online and telephone requests prioritised consistently?
• Is clinical information being reviewed at the right stage?
• Are administrative requests separated from clinical demand?
• Can the practice identify duplicate and repeat contacts?
• How long does it take for a request to be fully resolved?

Simply opening another route into the practice does not answer any of these questions.

Website experiences are improving

Among the lowest online-use practices, the median positive score for ease of website contact was 54.9%.

Among the highest-use practices, it was 63.8%.

This represents an improvement from the equivalent 2025 figures, when the median results were approximately 47.6% and 57.8%.

Practices and suppliers appear to be making progress in how digital routes are presented. Patients may be finding it easier to navigate practice websites, locate the correct service and submit a request.

However, NHS App experience did not follow exactly the same pattern. This may reflect the difference between making a digital route available and designing an effective end-to-end process around it.

Telephone experience remains part of the digital story

One of the most striking findings is that practices with high online consultation use did not necessarily receive better telephone-access scores.

The median positive telephone experience score was:

This does not mean that online consultation systems cause poorer telephone access.

Practice size, operating model, local demand, deprivation, workforce pressures, patient demographics and available capacity may all influence the results.

Patients using the telephone may have different needs

Patients who continue to use the telephone may not be interchangeable with those who choose a digital route.

They may be:

A successful digital model must protect the quality of non-digital access rather than treating the telephone as a channel that can simply be switched off.

Overall experience is shaped by what happens after contact

Patients in the highest online-use group gave a median overall experience score of 77.7%, compared with 81.1% in the lowest-use group.

By contrast, the proportion of patients reporting that their needs were met remained high across every group, with median results around 90% or above.

This points towards three separate stages of access.

Digital tools primarily change the first stage. Patient experience depends heavily on the second and third.

An online form does not create workforce capacity. It does not decide clinical priority, protect continuity or ensure that a suitable appointment exists. Those outcomes depend on the operating model behind the form.

Continuity remains one of the central challenges

The median proportion of patients who saw or spoke to their preferred healthcare professional was:

• 48.3% among the lowest online-use practices.
• 36.0% among the highest online-use practices.

In the 2025 analysis, the corresponding medians were 43.1% and 33.9%. This suggests some improvement across both groups, but the difference remains significant.

For an acute and straightforward problem, speed may be the priority.

For multimorbidity, frailty, mental health, safeguarding, palliative care or an evolving diagnostic issue, continuity may be more valuable than the fastest available appointment.

What has changed since 2025?

What should practices do with their 2026 results?

The GP Patient Survey should not be treated as a league table or a judgement on a single year’s performance.

It is most useful when combined with operational evidence from within the practice.

The survey can identify where patients are experiencing a problem. Operational data is needed to understand why that problem may be occurring.

Five questions for practice leadership teams

1. Are our access routes working as one system?

   Telephone, website, NHS App and face-to-face access should not operate as separate queues with different rules and inconsistent outcomes.

2. Are we measuring total demand?

   A reduction in telephone calls may appear positive, but not if it is accompanied by a larger increase in online requests, repeat contacts or unresolved submissions.

3. Is our triage model adding value?

   Triage should improve prioritisation and navigation. It should not become another administrative stage through which every patient must pass.

4. Are we protecting continuity where it matters?

   Practices should identify patient groups for whom relational continuity is clinically important and build that requirement into their navigation and booking processes.

5. Can patients understand what happens next?

   Clear acknowledgement, realistic response times and visible next steps can be as important as the route through which the patient contacted the practice.

The next phase of access is integration

The 2026 GP Patient Survey presents a cautiously positive picture.

Patient experience has improved across several measures, and online access is becoming more established.

But the results also show why digital access should not be viewed as an end in itself.

The practices receiving the most online requests generally receive fewer telephone calls, yet they do not automatically achieve higher overall experience, better telephone ratings or stronger continuity.

The next phase of access transformation must therefore focus less on the number of doors available and more on what happens after a patient walks through one.

Digital access may change the front door. It is the operating model behind that door that determines the patient’s experience.

Explore the 2026 GP Patient Survey results

The Haresign.net GP Patient Survey tool allows practices to review their latest results, compare scores and explore how patient experience is changing across access, continuity and care.