The NHS is facing a chronic shortage of family doctors after official figures showed some GPs were responsible for 9,000 patients.
Rowena Mason
Telegraph [UK]
26 Dec 2011
More than a million people were registered with a GP who served more than 3,000 patients, almost twice the average list size of 1,600.
Experts warned that doctors with vast numbers of patients might not be providing the best service, with their practices seeing poorer care and longer waiting times.
The figures show the worst surgeries for securing a doctor’s appointment within two days have 50 per cent more patients per GP than the average practice.
Leading doctors warned that the problem was likely to be exacerbated by reforms planned by Andrew Lansley, the Health Secretary.
Dr Michael Dixon, chairman of the NHS Alliance, which represents the UK’s primary care trusts, said it was a question of whether doctors were “able to cater as well for each patient with a list once they get much over 2,000 or 3,000”.
He said shortages were already being seen in inner cities, but recruiting GPs had become a problem even in affluent rural areas such as his practice in Devon.
“We’re not producing enough GPs as opposed to specialists,” he said. “Our workforce is in the wrong place. It’s in hospital whereas it needs to be in the community. This is already beginning to show and it will get worse over the next year or so.”
England has 25,000 family doctors, but there are growing concerns that the NHS faces a retirement crisis…
The article continues at the Telegraph.
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