Doctor’s plea Call for patients to play part before GP visit
ADOCTOR who has just retired has urged all of us to think hard before seeing a GP. Diane Marson, who was instrumental in setting up Cleevelands Medical Practice in Bishop’s Cleeve, near Cheltenham, three years ago, said doctors were under a huge amount of pressure due to an increased number of people seeking to see them.
She said there needed to be a shift in emphasis, with only patients who really needed to see a doctor actually doing so. She said that this, along with a different kind of service being offered by surgeries, would help GPS to cope better with the situation.
She said that the number of patientto-gp contacts increased by a third at the height of the coronavirus crisis and had remained high since.
She said: “There is a lot of pressure. I would ask patients to play their part by thinking about self care, perhaps going to the pharmacy first and considering whether they really need a GP.
“Other specialists can be contacted first up. Patients’ expectations need to be modified, along with the service provision.”
There simply were not enough doctors in the country to continue with the kind of face-to-face consultations that have traditionally taken place at GP surgeries in the past, she argued.
She added that while patients might want to see a doctor in the flesh, it was often not necessary for the treatment of their medical condition.
Dr Marson’s comments came just before she retired from the Sapphire Road-based practice after 28 years. The 60-year-old was a doctor for 35 years in all.
Originally from Northamptonshire, she came to Gloucestershire in 1987 to take up her first job in medicine – at Cheltenham General Hospital.
She later played a leading role in the creation of a brand new building for Cleevelands Medical Practice.
It opened in 2019, replacing the two previous surgeries of Greyholme in Bishop’s Cleeve and Seven Posts in Prestbury.
They had outgrown their premises and needed a new bigger home. Dr Marson played a key role in what was a long and complex process of providing a new site for the practice.
It all began in 2008 and took 11 years to complete due to factors such as administrative changes within the NHS and obtaining planning permission for the land on the outskirts of the village. She said: “It was a long process. About 99 per cent of that fell on my shoulders.
“It was pretty arduous. It was not something they teach you about in medical school, needless to say.”
The practice has 11,500 patients and covers Bishop’s Cleeve, northern Cheltenham and surrounding villages. Dr Marson said: “It’s a wonderful building for the community. My idea was always that it would be a hub.
“Not only have we got lots of doctors and nurses but physiotherapists, urology ultrasound, a pharmacy and a dentist on site. Not all of them are NHS but they’re here.”
The site has room for meetings to take place between other healthcare professionals and also hosts medical students.
It’s all a far cry from when she first became a doctor, when surgeries were so often much smaller in size.
Times have changed and she now feels she has done her bit.
She said: “I have always put the needs of the practice ahead of that of my family and myself. It is time to redress that balance and to pass the baton on to the next generation.
“I am confident that the practice is in an excellent position to meet future challenges and will continue to provide an excellent range of services for our community. Of course, I will miss working with such a remarkable team and seeing so many wonderful patients, but I will have the chance to contribute more time to voluntary work and less energetic pursuits.”
I would ask patients to play their part by thinking about self care, perhaps going to the pharmacy first and considering whether they really need a GP. Dr Diane Marson