Over three quarters of GPs have said that workload is compromising patients’ safety, a poll from the Royal College of GPs has revealed.
In the ‘GP Voice Survey’ of over 2000 GPs, 76% said that ‘patient safety was being compromised by their excessive workloads,’ and that six in ten GPs do not feel they have enough time in appointments to ‘adequately assess and treat patients.’
The RCGP survey also found that 62% of respondents do not feel that they have enough time to build the relationships with patients they need to deliver quality care.
RCGP chair Professor Kamila Hawthorne called the situation ‘deeply alarming.’
She said: ‘The fact that so many of our members say they’re not able to provide the high quality, safe care their patients deserve shows that it is patients who are bearing the brunt of the crisis in general practice.
‘We desperately want to spend more time with our patients – to treat the whole person, and provide the continuity many of our patients need, but our time is so constricted. Each fully qualified, full-time GP is now, on average, responsible for 149 more patients than they were five years ago.’
In response to these findings, the RCGP is calling on the next Government to increase the allocation of NHS funding that general practice receives and dedicate funds to recruitment and retention initiatives to boost the workforce.
The workforce issues in general practice are the result of simultaneous recruitment and employment crises.
At the BMA’s Annual Representative Meeting (ARM) last month, the conference voted in favour of a motion calling the BMA to ‘insist’ for ‘sufficient funding’ to allow GPs to employ the staff ‘they think best’ for their service and to maintain continuity of care.
Ring-fenced funding, such as the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme, has meant that that PCNs and practices are barred from hiring doctors.
An increase in funding would allow for practices to be able to pay GPs, and ease the employment crisis.
Last month, Pulse reported that over 80% of GP locums were struggling to find work, and that over half of job-seeking GPs were struggling to find a role.
The employment crisis is pronounced at all levels, with NHS England’s director of primary care admitting that newly qualified GPs are chasing jobs that ‘are not there for them’ and the BMA warned that thousands of new GPs might be unemployed in August due to the ‘nearly non-existent job market.’
Professor Hawthorne added that dedicated funding is critical in ensuring there are enough GPs to safeguard the future of general practice.
‘This is the only real route to improving our patients’ access to safe, timely and appropriate GP care, and all political parties need to take heed.’
This Conservative government ‘need to take heed’, Professor Hawthorne, especially after 14 years too long, and General Practice has reached this sorry state with them in charge. This certainly emphasises the need for the profession to vote Labour this week. Do it: Vote Labour; a more important and effective action than doctors’ industrial action. ( Cheerio Sanuk: what have you ever done for GPs, the NHS and patients? ).
Well I’m not voting for a human rights lawyer who doesn’t think they apply to certain brown people in the middle east.
It’s going to be more of the same from the red bunch.
They too have a lot of pharma and private healthcare influence upon them
Presumably the 25% who were not concerned about their workload and patient safety are ICB and PCN CDs who have distanced themselves from seeing actual patients?