We need 800 more GPs just to tread water
by combining data on population growth from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) with figures from NHS Scotland’s workforce survey.
The ONS data shows Scotland will need around 740 more GPs to cope with growing demand by 2020.
The NHS Scotland survey, published in June, showed Scotland had lost 90 GPs in the past two years alone – a rate of about one every eight days.
The combined figure of 830 is a conservative estimate of the number of doctors needed to maintain the sort of ‘reasonable coverage’ experienced in 2009.
Despite research saying that workload has increased by 16 per cent over the past seven years, the RCGP estimates the number of full-time equivalent GPs across the UK fell to 35,589 from 35,990 in 2013-14.
Overall, nearly 600 practices across the UK face closure within the next four years. There will be a shortfall of 9,940 family doctors nationwide.
Both the RCGP and opposition political parties have called on First Minister Nicola Sturgeon to honour her pre-election commitment to increase the amount of funding general practice receives – which is currently around 7 per cent of the total budget.
Dr Miles Mack, chairman of RCGP Scotland, said: ‘Scotland needs hundreds more GPs and it needs them as soon as possible.
‘The First Minister has said that the percentage share of NHS Scotland funding for general practice should be increased.
‘With that commitment expected to come to fruition in the coming Draft Budget, now is the time to become a GP.’
Scottish Tory health spokesman Donald Cameron said: ‘The Royal College makes the scale of the GP crisis clear today.
‘Before the election, Nicola Sturgeon was on record saying that GPs must receive a greater share of the health pot. Yet she’s been utterly silent on this since.
‘Unless she acts, people will rightly conclude that the SNP promised one thing before an election, only to bury that promise after it.
‘We want to see at least 10 per cent of health funding going to general practice by 2020.
‘Nicola Sturgeon made a commitment on GPs. It’s time she got back to the day job and delivered.’
Scottish Labour health spokesman Anas Sarwar said: ‘The SNP cannot continue to ignore the GP crisis. We are now looking at a shortfall of more than 800 family doctors by the end of the decade thanks to more than £1billion cut from primary care under the SNP.
‘Whilst further investment in general practice is needed, so too are reforms to the system to take the pressure off family doctors and get patients the care they need faster.’
GPs and their teams carry out 16.2million consultations a year in Scotland.
The RCGP has launched a new video and guide in the hope of solving the recruitment drought, presenting GPs as ‘expert medical generalists’ rather than ‘run-of-the-mill’ physicians who just treat coughs and colds.
Interestingly, it blames TV programmes such as Casualty, Holby City and 24 Hours in A&E for perpetuating the myth that ‘only doctors who work in hospital settings have an exciting and challenging role’.
A spokesman for Health Secretary Shona Robison said: ‘We will take no lectures from the Tories on this issue. Scotland already has the highest number of GPs per head in the UK – and the number has risen to an all-time high under the SNP, while we have increased the number of new training places for GPs by 100 across Scotland this year alone.
‘That solid track record of delivery is in stark contrast with the chaotic situation under the Tories in England, where the NHS has been gripped by unprecedented strike action from junior doctors.
‘We are continuously looking at how we can improve primary care and GP services against the backdrop of continued budget pressures coming from Westminster.’
‘The scale of the crisis is clear’