Question areas	Prompts
Understanding the concept of frailty Can I ask you what the term ’frailty’ means to you? Please describe the last patient you thought was clearly frail How do you usually use the word in your day? Are you aware about the requirements of the new GMS contract? What do you think about the requirements? Is it being enacted to meet older patient needs? To what extent do you think the new contract would help to address/improve frailty in populations? Are practice staff or community-based staff involved? How do people work together? In what ways? Can you give me an example of how the team works? What changes are you or your practice planning to make to meet these new requirements? What do you think are the key challenges to implement the new practice or manage frailty?	Do you view frailty as being a diagnosis or more of a process, like ageing? What made you think he or she was frail? How does this fit with what you want to do in terms of patient care? Can you give me an example of that? Are these tasks compatible with these people’s existing workload, skills, and professional identity? Are any informal care providers involved (for example, Age UK)? What is the capacity of general practices to do the work? Have new practice-wide policies been introduced? What do you think are the most important ways to overcome these challenges?
Identifying frail people How do you identify patients who are frail? How do you do your clinical assessment? Are you familiar with the eFI? (If ‘yes’: how is the eFI used in your daily practice or when you do your assessment at a patient’s home? If ‘no’: do you have a plan to use it in the future?) How do you respond when eFI pops up on your screen? If ignored, what are the reasons? What do you do then? Do you see benefits in identifying and coding frail patients as (a) derived by the patients, and/or (b) derived by the practice? Do you see any drawbacks?	Do you use standard instruments or your professional opinion? Is the same method used across the practice? Do you think the eFI will make a difference in terms of patient care, using resources, or minimising workload? Are you aware of the batch coding method? Does it help you to think about a patient in a different way? Which criteria does your practice use to justify the diagnosis? How do you document the diagnosis? What would you do with that code? How does it change what you do or could influence your decision?
Managing frail people How do you monitor the care of your patients with frailty? How do you describe the system you work in? How would you analyse and diagnose where the system can be improved? What are the challenges in the system to manage frailty?	What type of system do you use to track and follow these patients? Describe the process staff use to work together to care for patients with frailty? What are the different systems your system interacts with, and how does your system interact with these systems? How can we manage these challenges?
General Do you have any final comments or suggestions concerning the care of frail patients in primary care?	Is there anything you want to say that we have not yet discussed?

eFI = electronic frailty index. GMS = General Medical Services.