Thousands of patients lose online GP access after tech firm Silicon Practice collapses into administration, practice websites and online consultations vanish across Gloucestershire, Wales and London, tool was advertised as cutting surgery phone calls by 30 percent

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Thousands of patients have lost online access to their GP surgeries after Silicon Practice, the company behind the FootFall digital tool, collapsed into administration. Entire practice websites, online consultations and chatbots have stopped working, with Gloucestershire, parts of Wales and London among the affected regions.

Silicon Practice advertised FootFall as proven in more than 1,000 GP practices and as cutting calls to surgeries by 30 percent. NHS England says fewer than 10 percent of England's roughly 6,000 practices are affected, and advises patients whose practice website is unavailable to phone their surgery or attend in person. The West and North London integrated care board has told affected practices to inform patients that online consultation requests will be unavailable until an alternative provider is in place. Swansea Bay university health board knows of three practice websites that have ceased to operate.

Rowcroft Medical Centre in Stroud learned late on Friday that the company running GP websites across the county had gone into administration and ceased trading. Appointments, telephone calls, emails, the NHS app and the practice's Facebook page continue as normal; the services that stopped were the ones supplied by the vendor. NHS England says it has contacted affected practices with advice on maintaining business continuity and minimising the impact on patient care.

Rowcroft, its website gone, posted advice for patients on its Facebook page: anyone who had submitted an online form in the previous four hours and received no response should call its patient advisers.