Three weeks to see your GP as waiting times set to soar
WAITING times for a GP appointment are likely to surge towards three weeks because of a shortage of family doctors, a new survey warns.
Patients are currently waiting an average of about 13 days to see their doctor, with the time having jumped by three days since 2015.
Those delays are now predicted to “rocket” further over the next Parliament, as GPS are forced to spend an extra four hours each week seeing patients to keep up with demand, according to Pulse, the medical news magazine. The findings come amid warnings that growing waits for appointments are fuelling the A&E crisis.
Without urgent action, waits would quickly soar to “several weeks”, the British Medical Association (BMA) warned last night. A Tory pledge to add another 5,000 extra GPS by the end of the decade would be unable to keep up with the rise and the profession was already suffering a recruitment crisis.
The magazine found that waiting times for non-urgent appointments
were already more than a fortnight at 35 per cent of practices and more than three weeks at 10 per cent.
The findings, based on a survey of 830 practices, suggest that even with an extra 5,000 GPS, family doctors will still have to see patients for an extra two hours a week just to keep waiting times at two weeks.
Last month, record shortages of family doctors were disclosed, with a sixfold rise in vacancies, fuelling the increase in waiting times and surgery closures around the country.
Dr Chaand Nagpaul, chairman of the BMA’S GP Committee, said: “Unless the Government takes decisive action, waits to see a GP will rocket to several weeks in the coming years as patient demand continues to rise, and will seriously compromise patient care.”
He said the Government needed to stop “inappropriate” demands on GPS’ time, saying that one in four appointments was avoidable.
“Despite the continued hard work of GPS and their staff, practices simply cannot offer enough appointments to patients to meet the growing need,” said Dr Nagpaul.
“The NHS is at breaking point and we need politicians of all parties to avoid ducking the serious challenges facing general practice and instead address the problems that are all too apparent.”
Recent figures have shown nearly 12 per cent of GP positions are vacant, an increase from 2.1 per cent in 2011. The shortage is so acute that almost 20 per cent of GPS polled last month said they had given up trying to recruit a doctor in the past year.
Record numbers of GP practices are also closing, following a rise in the number of doctors retiring early ahead of a tax alteration on pension pots.