Conditions for use of GPAQ for PCTs

GPAQ is copyright of the National Primary Care Research and Development Centre at Manchester University and Dana Gelb Safran of the New England Medical Center Hospitals. The copyright can be found at the bottom of the first page and must be printed on each questionnaire.

There is a charge of 10p per questionnaire (plus VAT) for the copy of GPAQ by PCTs or other groupings of practices.

The charge of 10p per questionnaire is for the number of questionnaires copied for use in a survey using the consultation version of GPAQ, and the number sent out (including reminders) for a postal survey. This charge is incorporated into the charges made if you use one of our licensed companies, otherwise we will bill you directly. To do this you will need to inform the GPAQ Administrator of how many questionnaires you are copying (as above) and the name and address of who to send an invoice to for this charge.

The charge is to enable NPCRDC to continue to provide a support service for GPAQ; we receive no other funding for this. An average practice will get 40 points on the quality and outcomes framework simply for carrying out a survey, equivalent to £5000 per annum. 10p per questionnaire represents approximately one fifth of one per cent of the money that is coming in to practices via the PCT for carrying out surveys.

If your PCT wants to carry out a survey across your practices, you have two options. First, you can contact one of our suppliers, who will provide the service for you. This is what we recommend. As an alternative, you can print your own copies of GPAQ (for your PCT only), and carry out your own analysis. If you do this, you must pay the charge of 10p per questionnaire.

Technically, you could remain within the copyright restrictions by arranging your own printing (and paying the charge of 10p per questionnaire), and then arranging for a commercial firm to carry out the analysis for you (which is outside the copyright restriction). However, if you are doing this, you would be better off using one of our licensed companies as they are experienced in analysing GPAQ. Please do not be persuaded to use this mechanism by the small number of commercial companies who wish we had granted them a licence.

We have chosen to link licensing to printing and selling hard copies of GPAQ for simplicity of administration. There are no restrictions on third parties who simply analyse GPAQ data collected by others in order to provide reports. If you want to do this, you do not need to contact us.

There are currently no restrictions on providing a GPAQ service via electronic means (e.g. internet, PC based). However, we are currently considering our position on electronic means of disseminationg GPAQ, and if you are considering providing this service, you should contact us.

We recommend that you do not alter GPAQ. Indeed, the incentives in the GMS contract are linked to using GPAQ in the approved form. In other words, no questions can be deleted or modified. A lot of development work has gone into GPAQ and keeping it in its original form will also retain validity and allow comparisons to be made with benchmark data. You may add questions to meet the particular needs of your PCT if you wish. However, NPCRDC does not give specific approval to modifications of GPAQ.