IN MY VIEW...WEEKEND GP SLOTS ARE A GIMMICK

FOR some years, my practice opened on Saturday mornings. We didn’t expect huge demand and so had only one receptionist and one doctor on duty — but, in fact, the caseload rapidly expanded to such an extent that we were as busy on a Saturday as a weekday, but without a back-up team.

Left with no capacity for emergencies, we had to cease being available for routine, non-urgent appointments on Saturdays.

I was reminded of this recently when I read that a scheme which launched with great fanfare 18 months ago, offering weekend and evening appointments with GPs, has not proved overwhelmingly popular with patients, with about 25 per cent of the evening and weekend slots being left unfilled.

Given my experience, I can’t quite believe these figures and wonder whether patients are actually aware of the increased out-of-hours availability.

Also, in some areas, these extended appointments are book-ahead only, and not reserved for emergencies, which is surely the point of this out-of-hours service, which is an attempt to relieve the burden on hospital A&E units.

However, ultimately, I think the arrangement was a gimmick, promoted as a distraction from the emerging crisis in general practice — the diminishing number of GPs due to early retirement, aligned with a shortage of new applicants.

This was a strategy to persuade the electorate that all was well and the service was being expanded.

Matt Hancock, who was appointed as Westminster Health and Social Care Secretary in July, has publicly stated that GPs are the ‘bedrock of the NHS’.

The profession, and indeed patients, need him to turn his attention to evidence-based schemes — what’s been shown in pilot studies to work, rather than introducing any more superficially appealing flagship ideas.