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General Practice (GP) Collections

General Practice Extraction Service (GPES) collects information and data for a wide range of purposes including providing GP payments. It works in conjunction with the Calculating Quality Reporting System (CQRS) and GP clinical systems as part of the NHS Digital’s GP collections service.

GPES is made up of 

  • GP Data Collector a system used to request, collect, and process data from each GP system supplier and deliver it to the intended recipient. GP Data Collector (GPDC) is hosted by the Data Delivery Centre (DDC) on the Secondary Uses Service (SUS)+ infrastructure
  • GPET- E are extraction tools (GPET-E) designed by clinical system suppliers

The types of data GPES can collect

GPES can collect 2 different types of information:

  • effectively anonymised data that does not reveal an individual's identity
  • Patient-identifiable data (PID), that may identify an individual, such as a name, date of birth or postcode

PID data is only used when information is permitted by law or supports direct benefits to patient care.

Find out more about how we look after health and care information. 

Organisations we collect information from

Organisations we collection information from include:

  • NHS England information is used to collect GP payments, based on achievements under the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) and the delivery of quality services
  • other government departments for information about certain medical conditions and GP activity
  • universities and other organisations for academic research and services such as screening programmes

How GP collections work

Automated collection

We gather information and data, which is copied to our systems. Data is collected automatically over a specified period of time this is known as an extract. We usually use the following process:

  • GPs record activity in their clinical systems for the services they provide
  • NHS England, NHS Improvement (NHSI), or another organisation, requests information about a particular GP service
  • NHSI area teams offer GPs the option to participate in collections for that service
  • GPs agree to participate in collections for that service on CQRS
  • we collect information from GP clinical systems using GPES over a specified period
  • if required, GP staff enter information manually into CQRS
  • we display the information we collect in CQRS
  • GPs check that the information collected is the same as is in their clinical system
  • if its payment related, General Practice ‘declare' information from the collection to Regional Local Offices - who approve via CQRS
  • we provide the information to the organisation that requested it
How an automated collection works
  1. The activity is recorded on a GP system
  2. NHS Digital extracts the automated data from the clinical system to CQRS
  3. The general practice manually enters activity data into CQRS
  4. CQRS automatically calculates the payment due to the GP practice based on activity
  5. The proposed payment is sent to the GP practice for payment
  6. The proposed payment is sent to the region or CCG for two approval
  7. The payment is set as approved by NHS Digital and released from CQRS.  

Manual collection

Some GP information, including enhanced services data needs to be inputted by hand into CQRS,

This is either because the service has not yet been set up for automated collection, or because the organisation requesting the information has not chosen this method. 

Once the data has been inputted into the system the manually collected information is processed and displayed in CQRS in the same way as automatically collected data.

If a service needs to be manually inputted we provide GPs with a user guide to explain this process and also inform GPs before this process starts. 

Requesting a new GPES automated collection (2021/2022 requests)

We are no longer taking any further applications for 2021/2022. If you have any questions, please contact us at enquiries@nhsdigital.nhs.uk. 

Services supported by CQRS for participation only

Contact details

If you have a question about the GP Collections service.  Please contact CQRS technical support, support@cqrs.co.uk .

From 1 November their new phone number will be 0330 124 4039.

Further information

Last edited: 23 December 2020 11:43 am