Reflecting on the GP Patient Survey webinar 2026: 20 years of measuring patient experience in primary care
The survey findings provide valuable insights into patient experience with GP practices, and other local primary care services, across England. The aim of the webinar was to share information about the survey itself, the results, and how to use and access the findings.
The webinar covered:
- The history of the survey
- How it is run
- Key findings
- How to find the results on the website
- Ways the data can be used
You can watch the webinar here.
The GPPS team invited questions about the survey throughout the webinar and answers to these can be found below.
Will GP Patient Survey results be available at neighbourhood level in future?
At the moment, there is no officially agreed or published neighbourhood mapping information. As a result, it is not possible for us to include this information in the published outputs. However, we are aware there is demand for this, and are keeping it under review with NHS England.
Can dentistry results be made available at a more local level?
Currently, dentistry results are available at ICS, NHS region and national level. They are not available at a more local level (such as PCN or practice level), as services do not map directly to these geographies and patients may travel outside their local area to access dental care. This also ensures that these results are not linked to GP practices, who have no control over the delivery of dental services. If you have a need for this data, please contact the team at [email protected].
Could results exports be improved so users can download only their practice results alongside national and ICB comparators, rather than all practices?
Practice results are available via a few different outputs, intended to meet the needs of different users. Most outputs include the national result and the ICB comparison:
- Practice Excel reports – these include comparisons with other practices and the national result. It can be easily filtered to show only your practice, or unwanted rows can be removed in your own copy.
- Patient experience page on the website – search for your practice using the search bar on the homepage to access this page. You can download results for your practice alongside the ICB and national results. You can also add comparisons with other practices.
- We also provide a practice infographic which highlights a range of key patient experience measures alongside national and ICB comparators.
If you would like copies of the practice infographic from 2024 or 2025, please contact the team at [email protected].
How does the GP Patient Survey ensure results are representative of practice populations, particularly given response rates and differences between patient groups?
Patients are randomly selected from all adult patients registered with a GP in England. Around 3 million patients aged 16 and over were selected to receive the GP Patient Survey this year. Random sampling ensures every eligible patient has an equal and known chance of being selected, allowing the survey sample to be representative of the wider registered patient population.
Patients are eligible if they have a valid NHS number, have been registered with their GP practice continuously for at least six months, and are aged 16 or over.
We do not target specific groups within the sample. However, we do weight the data to account for differences between the population of patients registered at a practice and those who ultimately respond. Weighting helps ensure the results better reflect the wider practice population, including groups that may be less likely to take part, such as younger patients.
We also use minimum sample size targets for practices and PCNs (100 and 200 responses respectively). The number of patients selected is based on predicted response rates and is designed to achieve sufficient responses to produce statistically robust results and confidence intervals.
We recommend using GP Patient Survey findings alongside other sources of evidence, such as local feedback, practice context and additional patient surveys. Results should be interpreted as part of a wider picture rather than in isolation.
For more information on weighting, see: https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/weighted-data.
How well does the survey support patients who speak English as a second language?
It is important to us that everyone can take part and feel their views are reflected in the survey findings. The GP Patient Survey aims to be as accessible as possible for all participants.
Patients can complete the survey online in one of 14 languages other than English. These include: Arabic, Bengali, Chinese (Simplified), French, Gujarati, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Romanian, Slovak, Spanish, Turkish and Urdu.
Links to translated materials and survey access are available on our languages page: https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/other-languages.
Patients can also take part in other languages through a telephone interpretation service. Information about accessing this service is included in survey communications and on the GP Patient Survey website: https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/access.
Survey materials are written using clear and accessible language and have achieved the Plain English Campaign's Crystal Mark standard.
Are all survey respondents users of GP services, or are they simply registered patients?
Patients who have not recently contacted or visited their GP are still encouraged to take part, as their views remain valuable, and provide additional insight, for example, among those who were not able to get an appointment last time they tried.
The survey contains questions about when patients last contacted their GP practice and when they last had a general practice appointment. These questions help provide context for responses. Patients who have not recently used services are routed past questions that are not relevant to them, such as detailed questions about appointments or contact experiences. In 2026, 88.9% reported contacting their GP practice and 83.5% reported having a GP practice appointment in the last 12 months.
Are the increases in online completion linked to declining response rates, and what is being done to encourage participation in the survey?
While overall response rates have changed over time, we are also seeing a genuine increase in the number of people choosing to complete the survey online. Both the proportion and the absolute number of online responses have increased, suggesting that online participation is growing in its own right rather than simply reflecting a decline in paper responses.
This trend is consistent with wider changes in how people choose to engage with surveys and digital services. However, we know this is not true for everyone, which is why we continue to offer a paper questionnaire.
We provide a communications toolkit each year that practices and organisations can use to promote the survey and encourage participation. This can be accessed here: https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/promote.
How are decisions made about adding new topics or services to the GP Patient Survey?
The content and scope of the survey are reviewed regularly to ensure it continues to provide valuable insights while remaining an appropriate length for respondents. Each year we log all feedback and requests for additional questions. Suggestions for new topics and services are reviewed as part of the survey's ongoing development with NHS England.
While there are currently no plans to include optometry, we continue to consider how the survey can best reflect patients' experiences of primary care services.
Why does the survey ask about choice of GP practice location when many practices only operate from a single site?
The questionnaire needs to be relevant to practices delivering services in different ways. While many practices only operate from one site, some work with other practices to offer appointments from a range of locations, while others provide home visits.
As a result, although patients registered at single-site practices would generally not be expected to select this response option, some patients may still do so depending on how they access services. Results to this question should be reviewed with local context in mind.
How should access-related measures, such as telephone access, online services and the NHS App, be interpreted?
The survey measures patients' experiences and perceptions of different ways of accessing primary care services.
The NHS App is becoming an increasingly important route through which patients access services such as appointment booking, prescription requests and health information. Although GP practices have limited influence over some aspects of the App's national functionality and design, understanding patients' experiences of using the App provides valuable insight into how people access and engage with primary care.
The survey also includes separate questions about different contact methods, including telephone and online routes. For example, telephone access results are based only on respondents who have attempted to contact their practice by phone. Patients who have not used the telephone route are excluded from those measures.
We recommend interpreting these findings alongside one another, rather than in isolation, to build a fuller picture of how patients access and experience primary care services. As access routes continue to evolve, considering these findings together helps provide a more balanced understanding of patients' experiences.
How are pharmacy and dentistry represented within the survey, and are there plans to rename it?
The survey captures experience of primary care services; GP practices, dentistry, out of hours care and pharmacy. While it has broadened out from a focus on GP services, there are currently no plans to rename the GP Patient Survey.
Pharmacy results are published at all levels. Dentistry results are published at ICS, NHS region and national level.
There are currently no plans to include optometry in the survey. However, the scope of the survey is reviewed regularly to ensure it continues to provide valuable insights into patients' experiences of primary care services while remaining manageable for respondents.
Can results and trends be displayed more easily across multiple years to help users track improvement over time?
The GP Patient Survey website allows users to compare results across survey years and track changes over time using the analysis tool's Trends feature: https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/analysistool/hierarchy?trend=1.
This allows us to review and compare results across multiple survey years to support analysis of changes over time.
If you were unable to attend the live webinar, or would like to revisit the information shared, you can access the following resources:
We welcome all feedback, so please don’t hesitate to contact us at [email protected] with any questions or comments.
