The Health Minister has said his Stormont department is scoping a new tech platform to improve telephone services for patients seeking to contact their GP.
Robin Swann said he understood the "frustration" of patients facing problems accessing GP services and that a working group has been established to examine the issues.
Patients have complained of struggling to get in touch with their local doctor amid pressures on the health service compounded by the Covid pandemic.
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Mr Swann defended telephone-first consultations by GPs, saying they allowed practices facing increased demand to support and treat a large number of patients.
But he acknowledged that some patients have experienced issues accessing their GP and outlined efforts to boost staff numbers and streamline services.
The minister was responding to a written Assembly question from DUP MLA Harry Harvey, who asked about resuming face-to-face GP consultations with the removal of Covid restrictions.
Mr Swann said GP practices will continue to provide both face-to-face appointments and alternative consultation options for patients as appropriate.
He said: "The general practice telephone-first consultations allow patients to seek timely medical advice from their GP for both routine and urgent problems.
"The GP determines the most appropriate approach to safely addressing the patient’s needs using their clinical expertise. Where a face-to-face appointment is appropriate, that will be arranged.
"Alternatively, the GP may decide, based on their clinical assessment, that a telephone consultation is appropriate or that the patient should be signposted or directed to other relevant services.
"This approach helps the GP to appropriately manage, treat and support the large number of us who seek clinical support and advice from our primary care practitioners."
He added: "I recognise that patients have experienced issues in contacting their GP services and understand the frustration this can cause.
"My department has established a working group to examine issues around access to GP services, with a view to recommending actions to be taken in the short and long term to improve the situation.
"This will include scoping a new GP tech platform to facilitate an improved telephony service."
Mr Swann said his department has increased the number of GP training places for 2022-23 by 10, bringing the total number in Northern Ireland to an "all-time high" of 121 this year.
He said access to primary care services was also being improved by a wider roll-out of multi-disciplinary teams, the introduction of advanced nurse practitioners and extra general practice nurses.
Last week a leading GP said although practices are dealing with hundreds of thousands of patients every week, they are still struggling to meet demand.
Dr Alan Stout, chair of the British Medical Association's GP committee in Northern Ireland, said the phone-first system helped prioritise patients "so the most urgent are seen quickly".
But he added: "We are still struggling with access, especially the phones. We still need better infrastructure, more GPs and bigger teams to deal with the volumes. We will keep trying, but it will be tough."
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