GP surgery receptionists and patients are being encouraged to be kinder towards one another to reduce abuse against staff and frustration for residents trying to book appointments.

Access to doctors has been an ongoing concern across Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent. In some cases this has led to anger, with some medical staff reporting being abused in the street or the surgery.

Health bosses have been taking action to improve access to services at GP surgeries however, Staffordshire County Council members have been told. And there has also been a focus on staff wellbeing and taking a "softer" approach when dealing with patients.

Lynn Millar, director of primary care and medicines for Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Integrated Care Board (ICB), said: "There's some support for receptionists we've put in place. There was quite a lot of reports that you could get into your practice a lot more easily now but sometimes the approach of the receptionist staff and the tone wasn't really where it needed to be and it contributed to some of the frustration.

"So we've developed a package called Weathering the Storm. It's about being kinder and supporting receptionists and all members of staff to take a step back and think about how their approach comes across to the patient."

The "be kind" message is also being promoted to patients, Ms Millar told councillors at Monday's health scrutiny committee meeting, following the increase in aggression towards staff previously reported at the end of 2021. She said there had been a lot of changes at GP surgeries since the start of the Covid pandemic.

But she added: "What we haven't done is communicated well enough what those changes are. I think that caused quite a lot of noise in terms of people being triaged by receptionists and asked for information and new workforce that people didn't know about when they wanted to see a GP and couldn't see one.

"I think we've learned from that and there's five key messages we're putting out to the public around the new ways of working; how you might receive face to face or a telephone appointment. People often feel quite aggrieved that a receptionist is asking personal details but these are professionals and this is fully in confidence – there are a series of triage questions that receptionists ask to get the patient to the right health professional.

"On the back of that we've employed nearly 400 whole time equivalent additional roles and we're promoting those roles so people feel familiar and more comfortable with having an appointment with one of those rather than their GP – or in addition to their GP. These are people like advanced nurse practitioners, pharmacists, urgent care practitioners and physios who would probably be better suited for certain conditions.

"For example some of the long term condition reviews may be carried out by a pharmacist who would probably understand the medication better than GPs. Or you might see a mental health practitioner rather than your GP around talking therapies.

"We're promoting the NHS app as a way of being able to access patient information and look at your Covid vaccination status. It's really easy to use and you can book appointments through there.

"We've done quality visits with all of our practices and are working with those practices that have low face to face appointments and poorer access. While we can see an overall improvement in access across the piece we do know it is not consistent and there are some practices that are still not where we need them to be."

Improvements are also being made to telephone systems, the committee was told, in a bid to cut the time patients wait for their calls to be answered. Ms Millar said: "One of the things that was a real bone of contention was the time people were waiting on the telephone.

"Back in July last year we had a 28% increase in activity in one month when we came out of lockdown and waits were very long in some circumstances. It was causing a lot of the anger.

"One of the things I hope people will notice when they call their GP is the different way of managing the telephone systems. We're moving towards cloud-based telephony, which is a lot more efficient way of managing the systems.

"At times of high demand patients are given the option for call back; they keep their place in the queue, the receptionist will call back and they will be offered an appointment. I've tested this myself so I know it works, it really does take away some of the stress and strain of waiting for the call to be answered."