Over nine in 10 Welsh GPs are ‘routinely unable’ to meet patient demand due to high workload, according to a new BMA survey.
The survey, which will be presented to members of the Senedd at a GP event today, also found that 87% of GPs feared their increasing workloads are ‘impacting patient safety’.
Over half of GP partners responding to the survey are ‘planning their exit’ while a third of salaried GPs plan to work less than full-time.
The BMA, along with 704 GPs, have written to the Welsh cabinet health secretary calling for ‘immediate steps’ to restore ‘fairer’ general practice funding.
This comes as the Senedd’s first minister Vaughan Gething has been forced to step down after four members of his cabinet resigned and called for him to go.
Earlier this month, the BMA Wales GP Committee warned that they are ‘actively evaluating all available options’ for a dispute against the Government following delays to the 2024/25 contract negotiations.
Contract negotiations for 2023/24 were also delayed and ended without agreement in February, as practices received a 4.4% funding uplift backdated to April 2023, which the GPC said was ‘sub-inflationary’ and ‘inadequate’.
According to the recent survey, which had 375 respondents, almost three quarters of GPs (73%) would be prepared to take ‘some form of industrial action’ unless the Welsh Government took immediate steps to ‘restore a fairer portion of NHS funding’.
As part of an ‘urgent rescue package’, the union has called for the Government to restore general practice’s proportion of NHS Wales health funding to match the 2005/6 figure of 8.7%.
Welsh GPs are also calling for a ‘national standard’ for the maximum number of patient contacts per day as well as a national workforce strategy for GPs.
The event today is part of the BMA’s Save Our Surgeries campaign, which launched last summer.
It comes after Wales saw its 100th GP practice closure since 2012 earlier this year.
GPC Wales chair Dr Gareth Oelmann warned that ‘inaction is not an option’ in light of the survey results.
He said: ‘I’m afraid without a fairer portion of NHS funding, the situation is grave, and if general practice fails, the rest of the NHS will follow.
‘Our patients are already seeking private healthcare because of the huge waiting lists in secondary care and we’re seeing this trend in primary care. Without immediate action, this inequity will only deepen, impacting on the most vulnerable in our communities.’
RCGP Wales chair Dr Rowena Christmas said she is ‘constantly’ apologising to patients for circumstances that are out of her control, which is ‘morally distressing’.
She continued: ‘If we had the proportion of the NHS Wales budget we are asking for, we would have a sustainable general practice, with better access for patients, and time to offer holistic, preventative medicine. This would be good for patients and would alleviate pressures on secondary care.’
One respondent to the survey said the situation is ‘beyond dire’ and that they have ‘no hope the NHS can be saved’.
‘I am determined this job will be my last in medicine and I am only still going because I know the practice will close if I stop. I don’t want to make staff redundant.’
