England’s GP postcode lottery was laid bare today as NHS figures showed the nation’s busiest practices are dealing with up to 70 times more patients than others
England’s GP postcode lottery was laid bare today as NHS figures showed the nation’s busiest practices are dealing with up to 70 times more patients than others.
The patient-doctor ratio across the country has jumped since 2015 following a staff exodus, v88toto closure of surgeries and an ever-increasing patient list.Practices now deal with around 9,500 patients each, compared to 7,465 seven years ago.
MailOnline analysis of the data shows Hastings Old Surgery in East Sussex has nearly 15,500 patients for every full-time GP.
In contrast, Sampford Peverell Surgery, near Tiverton in Devon, has only 218 patients registered for every full-time doctor at the practice.
Dennis Reed, v88toto director of Silver Voices, a campaign group for senior residents, said the ‘postcode lottery’ was ‘just not justifiable’.Labour said patients deserve the ‘security and respect’ of being able to access a GP who can give them the care they need.
It comes as a report today warned the wait to see a GP is only set to grow.
Nearly six in 10 GPs now work three-day weeks, according to Government-backed research. And a third of family doctors — who earn an average of £100,000 a year — want to retire within five years.
GPs have complained about rising workloads and paperwork, increased demands from ‘problem patients’, and having ‘insufficient time to do the job justice’.They also claim the row over a lack of face-to-face appointments has caused morale to drop.
Experts told MailOnline No10 has to ‘make good on its manifesto promise of 6,000 more full-time equivalent GPs by 2024’ in order to solve the general practice crisis.The number of family doctors working in England has fallen consistently since the former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt first pledged to boost the workforce in 2015.
MailOnline analysis shows Hastings Old Surgery in Hastings has nearly 15,500 patients for every full-time GP as of February 28, the latest date official figures go up to.
In contrast, Sampford Peverell Surgery in Devon has only 218 patients registered for every family doctor working at the practice. *Sussex NHS Commissioners, which commissions the Hastings Old Town Surgery, disputes the figure provided to NHS Digital by the practice. It says the practice has 7.5 FTE GPs, rather than the 1.56 recorded by the health service.
East Riding of Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which runs the Leven and Beeford Medical Practice, disputes the NHS figure. The practice actually has five times as many GPs as it reported, with another joining in May. North East London CCG, which runs the Gough Walk Surgery, also said the practice has nearly five times as many GPs as it reported to the NHS ** practices cater to care home residents only *** practices cater to homeless people only
The patient-doctor ratio across the country has jumped a quarter from 7,465 in September 2015 to 9,457 in February this year, according to NHS Digital data
Before the virus hit the UK, around eight in 10 GP appointments — only half of which are actually with family doctors — took place face-to-face.The figure plummeted to 46 per cent at the start of the pandemic as phone and video call appointments were hailed as a way to reduce the spread of Covid. But despite the easing of restriction, situs togel the proportion of consultations that are in-person has only bounced back to 61 per cent
Map shows: The proportion of GP appointments that were made face-to-face in NHS clinical commissioning groups across England in February, the latest date data is available for
<div class="art-ins mol-factbox health halfRHS" data-version="2" id="mol-97da2610-ba7c-11ec-9137-c3742b1be4d7" website ratio is 70 times higher in some areas of the country