DAUK\u2019s Dr Steve Taylor says GPs are carrying out 20 per cent more appointments than before the pandemic while their funding has been reduced by 20 per cent in the past eight years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking on national radio, Dr Taylor, GP spokesperson for the Doctors\u2019 Association UK, said the collective action voted for by family doctors was about their safety and that of patients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said by taking collective action GPs were working to their contract and that they were \u2018not stopping work, downing tools, or walking away from patients\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr Taylor said: \u201cOver the past 30 years we have added and added to the workloads that GPs do, and this is a case of working to contract.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSince 2019 we are doing 20 per cent more appointments than we were before the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve increased the number of appointments, and that includes face-to-face appointments, telephone appointments, e-consults, the number of prescriptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“In the context of what\u2019s going on, it\u2019s GPs saying hang on a second, \u2018we can\u2019t do this anymore\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis is about providing for patients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s saying we can\u2019t carry on doing all the things we\u2019ve been asked to do in addition to caring for patients,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr Taylor was speaking on the Vanessa Feltz programme on LBC, and told listeners about some of the issues that are placing increasing demand on GPs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOne in nine patients are currently waiting for hospital treatment, and those one in nine patients aren\u2019t waiting passively,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey\u2019re coming to see GPs, asking us to write letters and sometimes they\u2019re ill with pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019re having to deal with a lot of people who, ten years ago, would\u2019ve been dealt with a lot more quickly by the hospitals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAnother example is a number of the proformas we\u2019ve been asked to fill out take a lot longer than old fashioned referral letter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe used to write to our colleagues at the hospital and say can you see x, because they\u2019ve got y and can you exclude z?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNow we have to fill out a proforma which can take five or six minutes to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t sound like much but in the context of providing a 10 or 15-minute appointment, that\u2019s half an appointment when it used to take a minute to write a letter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s all added bits of work as time has gone on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c30 years ago, my average working day was about eight to eight and a half hours. It\u2019s gone up to 10 to 11.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe number of appointments I was doing back then was 27 a day, it went up as high as 50 at some points, a mixture of face-to-face, telephone and e-consults.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn addition to that, the funding has been cut. We\u2019ve got 20 per cent less funding per patient than we had even eight years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt means we have fewer doctors and nurses in practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe average number of patients a GP looked after was 1,800. It\u2019s now 2,300.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf we had more money we could employ more doctors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere isn\u2019t a shortage of doctors, we\u2019re producing 4,000 doctors a year through the training programmes, but we\u2019re now in a position where many of those can\u2019t get the amount of work that they want \u2013 and some are unemployed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr Taylor emphasised that the collective action was \u2018not about pay\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He told LBC listeners: \u201cIt\u2019s about making sure patients get access to GPs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cEvery single day 1.4 million people have access to GP practices, which is huge numbers of people, and it was 1.2 million not that long ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBut we can\u2019t carry on doing all of that. It\u2019s not possible without the extra resources and extra funding being brought into practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe care for patients. I wouldn\u2019t have been a GP for 30 years if I didn\u2019t genuinely care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve done everything we can possibly do with the resources we have. We basically pleading for more.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n