Obtaining the views of general practitioners on the services to which they refer patients--a locality approach

A survey, with a locality emphasis, of the opinions of Fife general practitioners (GPs) on the quality and availability of a selection of services to which the GPs refer their patients was undertaken. Far more GPs rated services as 'poor' for availability than for quality. GPs acting as locality advisers were actively involved in the planning and execution of the survey as well as the dissemination of the results. The overall response rate was disappointing considering this approach.