LumiraDx has published the findings from its first annual UK survey, ‘Point of Care Diagnostics: A Clinician's View’, designed to understand clinician perspectives on the latest point of care technologies available.
The UK blinded survey polled clinicians on a number of areas related to point of care testing (POCT) to evaluate key concerns and benefits, testing locations, environmental benefits, and funding sources.
Findings from the survey revealed a few central themes including the ongoing time and bandwidth stresses felt by the majority of clinicians, the future growth of community testing, and, importantly, an overwhelming focus on the patient impacting GP’s diagnostic decisions. In addition, the report also showed a great majority of clinicians saw the environmental value POCT brought in support of the NHS roadmap to achieve ‘net zero’ by 2045.
Key findings included:
- Patient care: Clinicians ranked ‘Improved quality of care’ as the number one benefit of POCT, over operational costs and time saved
- Staff time: The top concern for clinicians when ordering a laboratory (not POC) test was wait time. 81% of clinicians said reduction of staff time for patient follow-up supported by POCT was extremely to moderately important to them
- Location: Nearly three-quarters of clinicians estimate the role of community health is expected to expand, anticipating high growth from pharmacy and a centralised/community hub
- Environmental impact: 83% of clinicians acknowledged the potential of POCT in reducing the carbon footprint of testing by reducing patient visits, was moderately to extremely important in their adoption of POCT
- Funding: Most funding for POCT today comes from individual practices and Primary Care Networks (PCNs). However, going forward nearly half of the clinicians feel funding from Integrated Care Systems/Boards will increase.
“The last few years have been incredibly challenging for clinicians across the UK,” commented Pooja Pathak, LumiraDx Chief Product Officer. “This survey allows us to get a pulse on how these changes in healthcare are impacting clinicians’ attitudes on diagnostics, the stresses that they are feeling and how they are looking for testing to support them in their patient management. From these results we can see not only a growing comfort with point-of-care testing, but also a growing need for the unique solutions next-generation POCT provides through rapid and accurate results.”
The blinded survey, conducted by a third-party, was held online between October 7-14th surveying 200 UK doctors in private, group practices as well as urgent care. The full survey results for both the UK and US reports are available at go.lumiradx.com/clinicians-survey-2022.