Lack of proper investment risks GP service collapse

The BMA has reiterated the need for proper funding for general practice, saying the service risks collapsing if current pressures are not addressed.

Dr Mark Sanford-Wood, GP committee England deputy chair, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that services are particularly intense in Plymouth, where four partners at one practice handed their contracts back due to workload and financial pressures.

The exasperated situation saw Dr Rachel Tyler, one of the former partners, completing CQC paperwork from an oncology ward where she was herself undergoing cancer treatment, highlighting the desperate state of working conditions. She stated that she feared patients would be left with no GP services at all in the region if more doctors hand back their contracts.

Sanford-Wood, who works as a GP in Devon, said: “The situation in Plymouth may be particularly intense, but it should be seen as a warning of what the rest of the country faces without urgent action to address the pressures in general practice. Patients are already facing unacceptable waits as doctors face unmanageable and potentially unsafe workloads, while increasingly burdensome administrative tasks mean GPs are able to spend less time on the front line delivering care to those who need it.

“The current funding settlement in general practice means most practices are operating on the edge of viability, and unless more is done by the government and NHS England – which includes addressing the severe recruitment and retention crisis – we are likely to soon see a repeat of the scenes in Plymouth across the country.”