Pressure Reporting | Primary Care OPEL Framework

Pressure Reporting | Primary Care OPEL Framework

Introduction

The Operational Pressures Escalation Levels (OPEL) framework aims to provide a unified, systematic, and structured approach to detection and assessment of acute demand and organisational pressure. 
While initially designed for hospital urgent and emergency care, NHS England announced in 2023 that General Practice will be incorporated into the OPEL system pressures framework. Apex now allows you to record and submit practice level pressure status to provide a representation across all levels of an Integrated Care Board to enable efficient response to such pressures. 

Utilising Pressure Reporting 

To begin, log into Apex here. You will see a box on your homepage containing details on your recent pressure report. 
To view the module, navigate to the Pressure Reporting tab on the left hand side. You will initially see an Overview of previous status submissions, with details on the source of pressure and plans to address that pressure. You can report as frequently as you wish, however please note that you will receive fortnightly push notifications via email as reminders to report your status. 
To begin a new pressure report, click on the blue plus button in the top right corner. 



You’ll firstly need to select a status; this will allow you to see the definitions which are displayed below.  
      Green – Pressure is at an acceptable level, and we are providing adequate services to our patients. 
      Amber – We are experiencing significant pressure but are currently able to provide adequate services to our patients. 
      Red – We are experiencing exceptional pressure, and our ability to provide adequate services to our patients is at risk. 
      Black – Pressure levels are extreme, and we cannot provide services to our patients. 



If you choose a status other than green, you are then prompted to specify the nature and causes of this pressure. 
As you choose a source, the list will extend to allow you to provide further detail and additional causes. You are also able to choose multiple sources if relevant. 
If you choose ‘Other’ for any of your pressures, you are provided with a text box to provide further information on the nature. 



Once you have selected the source of pressures, you can then indicate the practice’s plans for resolving or coping with the level of pressure. 



Finally, click the Publish button in the top right corner to submit your pressure report. 
If your Apex has been linked to an Enterprise Apex, such as your ICB or PCN, this report will push through to their view. 


Who can see my Pressure Reports?

To allow your ICB (or other Enterprise organisations) to see your pressure reports, you need to activate data sharing for pressure reporting. A system administrator level user can action this by navigating to Settings > Data Sharing > the 'Sharing Data' tab along the top > click Change Permissions > use the toggle for Pressure Reporting to activate this sharing feature. 



You do have the ability to activate sharing for only Pressure Reporting without activating the other data items listed, please utilise the toggle options listed to activate as preferred. 


Activating Pressure Reporting

If you are unable to see the Pressure Reporting tab within your Apex, please open a Support Ticket here and we will process this further for you. This can be activated for groups of practices and their Enterprise organisations to allow a mass reporting function, or this can be activated for individual practices who would like to record their status for their own auditing purposes. If you are interested, please do reach out and we will be happy to discuss your local requirements further.