ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines the development of nurse telephone consultation in out-of-hours primary care, presents two organisational models as examples of good practice and discusses evidence about safety, effectiveness and acceptability. The phone is an increasingly essential part of everyday life and services such as banking, insurance and shopping are increasingly accessed by telephone. The chapter offers some practical suggestions for setting up telephone consultation services and considers possible developments in the context of the national implementation of National Health Service Direct. Nurse telephone consultation is rapidly becoming an accepted approach to providing patient care and its profile is high in the United Kingdom. Its emergence within out-of-hours primary care has modified the care pathways traditionally available to patients. One of the main concerns co-operatives have about employing nurses for telephone consultations relates to responsibility and liability for their decisions and the advice that is given.
