Pulse journalist wins prestigious award for GP campaigning

Pulse senior reporter Anna Colivicchi has won a prestigious award for her investigation into hospital trusts failing to send clinical letters to GPs. 

At the Chartered Institute of Journalists (CIoJ) Young Journalist Awards last night, Anna took home the ‘Young Campaigning Journalist of the Year’, which recognises impactful journalism serving the public interest. 

Her award is based on Pulse’s investigation, ‘You’ve Not Got Mail’, which exposed how hospital trusts failed to deliver crucial patient documents to GPs – creating backlogs and potential risks to patient safety. The investigation revealed that such failures have persisted across England for years.

The judges were impressed with the ‘outstanding portfolio of stories constituting a superb campaign of investigative journalism with original content and sophisticated data journalism illustration’. 

They also noted that this is a ‘crucial subject’ that many of Pulse’s GP readers, as well as a wider readership, were not aware of, and it is explained with ‘clear, lucid and informative writing’. 

The judges added: ‘The journalism here is the overall winner because of its detailed and precise content inviting follow-up by the rest of the media. 

‘It is a major campaigning story affecting many people and inviting a clear response and demonstration of accountability from regional health trusts.’

Anna’s story found that GPs across the country had been left to deal with at least 724,000 patient letters which hospital trusts had failed to send, in several almost identical incidents. 

This was revealed via Freedom of Information data from trusts across England, with at least 18 having experienced IT failures which led to thousands of letters not reaching GPs. 

The CIoJ Young Journalist Awards celebrate excellence among journalists aged 30 and under across various categories.

Pulse was also recognised for its investigations into GP recruitment last year, winning B2B writer of the year and Best Use of Data Journalism at the BSME Talent Awards.