Myth 1:
Your GP has had a huge pay rise
Truth:
In 2003 your GP’s contract was changed.
They now have to pay their own employers pension
contribution so 14% of their “pay rise” goes to replace
what their employers were paying anyway. This is not some
special GP’s pension – every NHS worker gets the same
employer’s contribution paid for them.
The basic income for looking after patients stayed roughly
the same though there was now no increase for inflation.
Performance pay was offered to improve the care of
patients with Asthma, Diabetes, Heart Disease and other
chronic illnesses. Most GP’s were trying to improve
patient care anyway so they were happy to work harder to
look after patients better. This was extra pay for extra
work which the Government agreed needed to be done. The
wages for doing this work were agreed in advance and it is
dishonest to behave as if the cost was unexpected after
the work has been done.
Myth 2:
GP pay rises are bankrupting the NHS
Truth:
The NHS is roughly 3,000 million pounds in debt. The cost
of the GPs performing better than expected in the chronic
disease targets is 200 million. The 12,000 million pounds
being spent on the new NHS computer system completely
dwarfs any problems caused by GP’s achieving excellent
patient care.
For the past 2 years there has been no increase in basic
pay or performance pay to General Practices to cover
inflation or staff wage rises. Your GP has had to cover
these extra costs out of their own pocket. Although there
was an initial rise in GP pay with the new contract, GP
pay is roughly the same now as it would have been if the
old contract had continued.
Myth 3:
The NHS can extend the hours that GP’s are available to
patients at no extra cost without affecting quality.
Truth:
If you call out a lawyer or dentist or plumber in the
evenings or over the weekend you will pay more than during
normal hours. GP’s are no less professional and it costs
more to provide a routine GP service at unsocial hours. If
the NHS cannot afford to pay extra for routine care in
unsocial hours the only option will be to reduce the
quality of the service by using cheaper staff.
We have seen what happens when the NHS tries to provide
services 'on the cheap' with the out of hours services.
Your GP was offered £3 a year to provide medical cover for
you for evenings, nights, weekends and bank holidays. When
GP's were unable to do this the NHS tried to provide the
service using cheaper staff and the problems which arose
have been well publicised
Myth 4:
General Practice is inefficient and needs modernising.
Truth:
Your GP gets paid £50-60 a year to provide you with
unlimited appointments and home visits if necessary. This
is outstanding value for money and is less than a third of
the cost of a similar private scheme which does not
include free home visits.
In recent years the majority of our highly experienced
Dentists have been forced to leave the NHS and see
patients privately because their NHS funding has been cut.
Your GP is unlikely to strike because they are
professional and care about their patients. However if the
current cuts in funding to practices continue they may
have no choice but to leave the NHS to retire, emigrate or
become Private GP’s.
GP leaders have put these points to the politicians but
this has not changed the pace of the reforms forced upon
the NHS. Ultimately politicians will listen to voters at
election time and if it is important for you to keep your
NHS GP we would urge you to contact your MP and let them
know that it will affect how you vote.
Dr Rant
Dr Cardigan
Dr Blue
Dr Brown
Rev Dr Green
Dr Mustard
Mr Orange
Dr Pink
Dr Purple
Mr Salmon
Dr White
Mr Beige
Ms Scarlet
Dr Informed
Posts
72 comments:
you missed some bits...
the bit about
sign any old crap put in front of them by their receptionist or nurse
fucking impossible to see cos they surround themselvs with argumentative receptionists, dont work evening or weekends, close for lunch, no long off appointments, no short term appointments, come in exactly 2.5 days time at their appointed time and wait for 4 hours or fuck you...
you missed the bit about having no fucking choice which GP you can see, meaning if ur unlucky enuf to move into the catchment area of the worst GP in town you are fucked
you missed the bit about routinely covering up for each other, and we all know who the dangerous doc in town in, but try getting another doc to put it in writing...
you missed the bit about normally staffed by locums who cannot communicte in english
yea for the service we get GP's are on the whole overpaid
granted the crap GP's probably are not reading this
anon1
oh dear anon1 you poor thing.
As far as I understand it, appointments are another target from our lovely government, therefore it's not the docs fault. We also all know that medical receptionists are evil- that's what they are paid to do (Joking!!).
As was stated in the original rant docs don't work evenings or weekends due to the fact they are not obligated to do so under the new contract and the government only offered a paltry sum extra for this extra work, so sensibly most docs opted out.
If you have such major issues with the working practices of GPs then write to you MP, the DoH, anybody but arguing and attacking docs on the internet will NOT solve anything.
This is why the government shouldn't have control over the NHS. They will always mess it up.
Instead of having the government run it I think that each county should have a directly elected health commissioner elected by the citizens of that county. Those commissioners will be responsible for negotiating contracts and the general healthcare in their county. I think this would improve health a lot more.
GPs deal with enormous clinical risk everyday - no routine specialty opinion, imaging or blood tests available [routinely] at the time of consultation to back up a vast array of decisions that are made.
No, they have to develop the sort of clinical nous that rarely seems to exist outside of primary care [and possibly A&E] probably because of the effects of increasing specialisation - and incredibly they get it right most of the time.
My immediate and extended family [past and present] has been well served by GPs.
I find it remarkable really given the pitfalls that can lurk behind even relatively minor complaints.
GPs may be taken for granted, or worse, criticised for being expensive wasters.
But I wonder if their detractors are fully aware of the weight of responsibilty that goes with the job ? I doubt it somehow.
the A&E Charge Nurse.
i love good GP's
i just get pissed off with the small percentage of crap ones, and the fact there is nothing sytematic to sort them out
bollocks to more elected mandrins, give the patients the power! youd be amazed how soon sites would get cleaner if pateints could take their business elsewhere
if docs can rant to patients here, i dont see why patients cannot rnt back
anon1
Some patients are 'ranting up the wrong tree', if you will allow me to mix my metaphors!
A 'patient pandering' that service anon1 advocates would be an expensive disaster, undoubtedly lead to poorer outcomes for the majority, and would only really 'benefit' middle-aged, Daily Mail reading reactionary types (without improving their health outcomes).
A&E Charge Nurse - Thank you for you comments.
This post originated on Doctors Net UK. The plan is potentially to use this as the basis for an independent PR campaign around the country to counteract the recent deluge of anti-GP spin form the DoH and the New Labour cronies.
They are right you know anonymous. The British GP system works better than anything else I have encountered in the rest of the world.
At least not for £50-60 a year. They do some hard work. And the very best of them still look in on patients who are in dire straits. I know my GP used to stick his head round the door when my old Grandpa was about to peg it.
Sorry what is £50-60 per year?
Its not the GPs fault that the DoH couldn't negotiate itself out of a paper bag, but the decision to allow them to relinquish out of hours work was a disaster for patients and a disaster financially.
And I'm afraid you would be wrong to pretend most GPs pay has not increased significantly under the new contract.
It doesn't matter how they got it, no-one is interested in the details of QAF, the fact is that GPs now earn over 100k per anum, and in well run, high performing practices, some may double that amount. That is a lot of money to most people and GPs would do well to remember it.
So yes, point out that the overall cost impact to the NHS is not all that great, yes point out that GPs are being paid because they are performing well, but don't try to pretend that they are not very well paid for the job that they do, or people will laugh at you
used to, not much sticking their heads rounds doors these days
my health outcome would improve if i was actually able to see a GP without being forced to move town, and pay in the interim, for the simplist of prescription needs, if i could see one who spoke english better, and if i wasnt threatened by drug dealers in the waiting room
you seem to be advocating giving all the power in the relationship to the GP, which is pretty much how it is at the moment, not good for anyone, and sure doesnt encourage the crap GPs t improve
oh and ive encountered GP services in too many countries to mention, and granted British serice maybe cheap, but it sure aint even near the standard of the mediocre of the rest of the western world, and even looks bad compared to many developing countries
the nhs keeping down good private GPs and discouraging inovation in the way patients are treated isnt good for any of us
i really dont think you people see how crap the worst GP surgeries are, and you are sure short of ideas for sorting them out
anon1
Anonymous,
I'm sure there are several actions you could take if the condition of your general practice is a bad as you say it is. Have you approached the practice with your concerns?
I am genuinely sorry that you have had these problems, my experience of the NHS GP system has been overwhelmingly positive.
I'm sure there are private GPs in your area - there certainly are in mine. You praise the service they offer. So if you want to use them then just use them.
Ahmed Stewdent
Mens Sana wrote...
And I'm afraid you would be wrong to pretend most GPs pay has not increased significantly under the new contract.
I'm afraid he'd be wrong to pretend that GP's pay HAS increased significsntly (pro rata) under the new contract since it's inception. A hospital consultant really should be more up on their facts before challenging others'. The usual convention is to furnish the debate with 'evidence', rather than snide gainsaying. The effect of pension rebasing has grossly distorted the figures if one takes an ill-informed cursory glance at them......
As for OOH; If you were offered resident oncalls at £3 per hour, would you take it? That's how much the DoH decided to insult us by valuing our out of hours work at. We told them to fuck off and keep their £6k a year.
Presumably, mens sana, like a significant proportion of hospital consultants, has a private practice that augments his NHS income nicely.
A small percentage of hard working entrepreneurial GPs do earn multiples of the £100k average, but they are the primary care equivalents of the millionaire orthopaedic consultants, and as such represent a very small minority. Is that not fair if a surgeon can earn earn well in excess of half a million if he is lucky enough?
We really do not want to go down the GPs are inferior to hospital doctors route now would we?
Out-of-hours is interesting isn't it? Those who have never done it tend to have very decided views about whether and how it should happen.
I've done it all my working life, in hospital and out, usually for nothing.
At present I am on call every minute of every day. I AM paid for this...£1290 per month so, yes, about £3.00 an hour is, even now, how Our Blessed Leaders value this work. The market rate IS somewhat higher, but falling ...there's a disgraceful race to produce the most doctor-lite OOH system compatible with life. The bean counters always seem to put the "acceptable" excess loss of life at two in a million but don't explain where these figures come from.
I don't mind being on call. This is my choice, one that geography dictates if I wish to work where I do.
If I were elsewhere, I would not switch the light on, never mind get out of bed for £3 an hour. This would also be my choice and that is how it should be.
Anon 1...change your GP or your fucking attitude?
Isnt this old news?
The headline figure for GP earnings was announced months ago when 'THEY' had mistakenly added in the date to the total or something.
Now, conveniently, just when HMG is getting criticised about some other foul-up, this rewarmed 'correction' is placed in front of the press in the hope that they will be suitably distracted.
More spin.
re "Anon 1...change your GP or your fucking attitude? " yea ive moved town for the privilige, however dont expect my attitude to change when the nhs force me to take such action to get minimal service, catchment area issues are alive and well with GP services, and rather than worry about my attitude it would be better if you lot figured out ideas for sorting out the worst GP surgeries
yea free market out of hours rate is around 15 % of you hourly rate per hour on standby, plus about 4 hours pay minimum if you actually get called, rate goes up to relevant bank holiday rate on holidays and sundays, different industries entirely, but gives you an idea, again this is a break down in normal economics - i dont think the average patient in genuine need, pain etc, out of hours would have a problem paying a fair price IF they wernt being taxed to hell for a service that fails to deliver
Now, conveniently, just when HMG is getting criticised about some other foul-up, this rewarmed 'correction' is placed in front of the press in the hope that they will be suitably distracted.
More spin.
Not sure I get the jist of that.....
If politicians can plant unfavorable stories in the press when it suits them - i.e. just before announcing a pay cut for GPs for the second time in 2 years, why can't we rebut their deliberately misleading spin when it suits us....
With elections looming?
Fight fire with fire!
"The only rational response to a complete disaster is total defiance!"
The only way to defeat spin is to deal it back in spades, and this is achieved by tinkering with our 'democractic' processes. That is the way to get their attention.
Machiavelli is one of my middle names....
anon1 - you use the phrase 'genuine need' but who is the arbiter to decide if need is genuine or not ?
Take A&E for example, when patients turn on staff because it is rammed, surely it would be far more appropriate if they turned on each other, especially when a significant percentage have minor problems that could easily be dealt with elsewhere.
A&E is in effect hostage to the publics self appraisal of what constitutes an 'emergency'.
In recent weeks, we had one young couple requesting 'a virginity test', one man who called an ambulance 3 days after a car accident because the side of his neck felt sore, plus the usual assortment of sore throats, so-called flu [but still well enough to go to work during the day], and wax in the ears, etc.
Now a subset of these apparently minor conditions will in fact be the harbinger of something much more serious, prodromal meningitis, temporal arteritis, necrotising fasciitis [rather than good old cellulits], etc, etc.
Now all of this bread and butter to a decent GP, who after all earns less in a year, than Rio Ferdinand does in a week.
A&Es are already feeling some of the effects of the changes in OOH arrangements, and I can't help feeling that it would have been best to leave well alone.
Alternatively we could set up two adjacent hospitals, one run by medical staff the other run by the public.
They would then be able to decide amongst themselves who is in 'genuine need' and therefore who is entitled to treatment, and in what order.
the A&E Charge Nurse
the A&E Charge Nurse
yes A & E suffers cos of the breakdown of access to medical services of other types
again my overwhelming feeling is that FOR FUCKS SAKE THEY DO IT PERFECTLY WELL IN MANY OTHER COUNTRIES why oh why is it so bad in the uk
sorting out the nhs does not mean letting down the most needy, and should actually help sort out some of the nonsense A & E gets to deal with, but then again i have been laughed at by a wanker of a triarge nurse in A & E and been admitted as an emergency about 6 hours later
interestingly ive had to queue to beg for an insulin prescription from the most rude receptionists ive ever seen in any business, and this is in one of the better UK GPs, really it shouldnt take more than a week to sort out such piss poor service
Anonymouse.
Your expectations are, I think, way too high.
In my life I've lived in North Wales, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, London, Kent, Mid Wales, West Country, Birmingham, North West. Several times in some of them, and different places each time. I've had something like a couple of dozen different GPs in all, and never yet encountered one I wasn't content with, and three who were notably good, including my current one.
Stop bitching. We do ok with our GPs. And where, exactly, do you live that the GP services are so bad?
ah so the solution to piss poor service is for the customers to "stop bitching", great idea, im sure stalin would agree
this is in fact the nhs model as well as the complaints process is a sham, and the only other agent of change aka politics is very blunt, ie electorate vote for party offer best promises for healthcare get delivered shit
the medical business in the uk needs agents of change that allow grass roots innovation and continual improvement, and that means freeing the customers (and staff) to go to multiple providers, and allowing competition to work its magic
I think anon wants more 'competition' and 'innovation' so that he/she can be seen in Walk in centres and then referred straight back to her/his GP. Competition and innovation that will simply lead to a crap service for more money.
Does anon know of any country where there are no below average doctors?
Does competition miraculously cure this problem? Look how well competition is working in the states! The market is amazing!
Anon I suggest you stop chatting absolute shite and take a look at the real world.
anon - the solution to the problems in the states is simply to have in excess of 40million of people with no decent health service!
My, the wonders of competition and the market!
By the way we've had the internal market in the Uk for almost twenty bloody years- and it seems even you agree it doesn't work! A little inconsistency in your blind faith in the market, no?
re "I think anon wants more 'competition' and 'innovation' so that he/she can be seen in Walk in centres and then referred straight back to her/his GP. Competition and innovation that will simply lead to a crap service for more money." er no not at all
re "Does anon know of any country where there are no below average doctors?" no, but i know of many countries which actively resolve low performing GPs and practises
re "Does competition miraculously cure this problem?" yep, cos the customers go elsewhere, so at the big picture level it certainly sets a much better environment
re "Look how well competition is working in the states! The market is amazing!" the US is not a model i would endorse, look at new zealans, belgium, italy and many many more
re "Anon I suggest you stop chatting absolute shite and take a look at the real world. " ah but i am in the real world, it is everyone in the nhs who lives in a protectionist monolopoly who imoses shite on the patients
if you dont know how crap the nhs can be, come with me for a few days and ill show you
if you dont know how crap the nhs can be, come with me for a few days and ill show you
Come and stay with one of my patients, and you'll see how good it can be.
We'd all like equality of provision to be a reality, but it is not the GPs who are making it uneven - it's central 'planning' - alright?
well on that dr mustard i think we can agree
Excellent! We agree.
Now what are you doing to help change things?
We've recognised that change is a function of politics, and are engaged. Only part of what we are doing is protecting our profession from unfounded and malicious criticism.
We as doctors are the best and strongest advocates that patients have, and we should be protecting you from politicians - not the other way round.
Excellent debate, like the fight spin with spin idea - what happens next? Do we set up a political party, or a charity or a campaign website (let's call it 'DrRant'!)?
some GPs yes
there are some really crap GPs out there who you are ignoring again
other than that i dont think politics is going to solve much of this, we need to empower patients with spending decisions to allow bottom up changes to the system
Change can only be brought about in a democracy through political means though.
not at all
everytime someone likes the fish at sainsburys better than the fish at tesco, and goes to get his fish at sainsburys, these small little decisions shape the biggest businesses in the country, except of course the nhs
and individual end consumers are better at changing things by voting with their feet than anything ever done by a politician
Back to food are we?
With the NHS, how is 'voting with your feet', going to change anything at the present time? Go private - lower NHS demand - happier treasury - steady as she goes.
how?
give the patients to control their spend and take their money where they want
turn the service providers over to the market and let them compete
"everytime someone likes the fish at sainsburys..."
I love supermarket analogies. Can somebody tell me what the "resus aisle" would look like? Will there be special offers on Triple-As?
anon1
That requires political change, which was my point.
sloshed-nurse - the resus aisle is right next to the booze aisle, and no where near the assisted conception aisle, which is fortunate.
There's also a BOGOF offer on appendicectomies, but only whilst stocks last.
"resus aisle" come on how many resus does the average GP carry out a year? or the practise nurse? or the million and one elective procedures where resus has nothing to do with it
for the genuine emergency stuff you should look to the real experts for a management model, such as the fire brigde, or some of the good emergency units abroad, cos the typical nhs A & E is piss poor at the basics
so yea im open to other models of working when needed, but your status quo with more autonomy for the doctors model will not produce outstanding success, suggest you need to think a but harder
anonymous, your argument is deeply contradictory.
you want a market of choice for patients but you also want hihgly manageed and controlled doctors, this control and lack of autonomy is pretty 'stalinist' to use a term that you seem to enjoy using
the 'free market' where good care flourishes does not go hand in hand with a highly controlled profession, as where is their freedom to innovate and find new ways to imrprove the service?
your logic stinks
I'm afraid he'd be wrong to pretend that GP's pay HAS increased significsntly (pro rata) under the new contract since it's inception. A hospital consultant really should be more up on their facts before challenging others'.
I didn't quibble with your pro rata pay, but please tell me whether or not it is true that in their take home pay packets, after QAF payments etc most GPs are earning more than they were before?
If this is not the case I am very happy to hear it but none of my GP friends would agree with you. They would of course agree that the rise is not as high as it is spun to be, due to of all the facts you have cited, which is quite true. My point is that if you pretend to be paupers you will garner very little sympathy
As for OOH; If you were offered resident oncalls at £3 per hour, would you take it? That's how much the DoH decided to insult us by valuing our out of hours work at. We told them to fuck off and keep their £6k a year
Well yes, and as I said if you read my post I dont blame GPs for taking this stance. I blame the DoH for allowing them to get away with it
Presumably, mens sana, like a significant proportion of hospital consultants, has a private practice that augments his NHS income nicely.
Yes, I have a private practice income which brings my total gross salary up to just below the quoted average GP salary. For this I work 5 full days and 1-2 evenings per week, every week. I do not claim any extra NHS pay for my OOH work, though I am available at any time and quite often called in. I just don't make a song and dance about it because I feel I am being paid to do a job, not just to work a certain number of hours. If I wanted to do that I would be a locum and make myself rich but insane
A small percentage of hard working entrepreneurial GPs do earn multiples of the £100k average, but they are the primary care equivalents of the millionaire orthopaedic consultants, and as such represent a very small minority. Is that not fair if a surgeon can earn earn well in excess of half a million if he is lucky enough?
Again I didn't object to them earning the money. I have no doubt that they deserve it. They just shouldn't pretend to be poor
We really do not want to go down the GPs are inferior to hospital doctors route now would we?
Definitely not. The GPs I know are just as likely to be good or bad doctors as hospital doctors. Neither more nor less so. Sorry, who was being snide?
In case I didn't make myself clear enough.
People on the whole don't mind you earning money. You deserve it. But you have done well out of the new contract, just not as well as it is being spun. To pretend that somehow GPs are all suffering in penury will not help you to make your case
I certainly don't claim that GPs are under paid at all. We are not asking for more money, but expect inflationary awards so that we can pay our increased staff and business costs.
What we are trying to demonstrate is that pay would have gone up under the old contract, and that by and large the increased income has been matched by an increase in work and also a recognition of what as been done before for either no pay, or very little pay. The consultant contract is under similar 'pressure' - see 'Greedy doctor scum' a few days ago.
It seems strange that we should be forced to defend our wages under the pressure of spin and malign 'faint praise' from the DoH when in comparison to other professions, doctors are less well paid than they once were. This is especially unfair when the responsibility involved is greater now due to the imperative to prove one's probity etc. The risks of litigation and the associated costs to protect oneself consume quite a bit of our income (as I'm sure you well know) also.
You see that's where we fall for it every time . We are definitely NOT "forced to defend our pay". That we do is feeble in the extreme.
Can't remember the last time I attacked my bank manager about his salary. Really time I had a go at my dentist though...but then I can't. His list and those of all the dentists who operate in the town where we have our family home, are closed. This despite the fact that none of them now take NHS patients...people, lots of them, without dentists...that would be the market at work then?
re "the 'free market' where good care flourishes does not go hand in hand with a highly controlled profession, as where is their freedom to innovate and find new ways to imrprove the service?" yea they do
highly disciplined environment is needed where real time precise critical life or death decisions are needed
free market is needed where you can predict or plan options
freedom to innovate can happen in both environments, success should breed success, not the current nhs model of crap crap crap hospitals continuing for ever more
both can work together, they are not necessarily incompatible
there are plenty of ways of regulating safety critical services which operate in the free market
oh and docs pay should be related more to how the patients view things, there should be no problem asking patients to pay extra to be seen in peak or out of hours slots etc for instance, and let money be the way of negotiating the optimum solution between doc and patients rather than a crap pct and nhs mandrins, many more examples of this, then you see you really do get rewarded for good customr satisfaction
anon1
re "the 'free market' where good care flourishes does not go hand in hand with a highly controlled profession, as where is their freedom to innovate and find new ways to imrprove the service?" yea they do
highly disciplined environment is needed where real time precise critical life or death decisions are needed
anonymous, your answer here is very weak indeed
there is a difference between a highly controlled profession and a properly regulated profession
you can obviously not see this
I agree with the bit about getting passe the receptionist. I used to have that problem untill I pointed out to the GP that the GMC allows me to refuse to share my medical info with others, I no longer get asked why I want to see the GP. I have now stoped the admin staff accessing any of my clinical info (one of the very few that has managed this) and now only my GP knows my medical info.
You should be able to ask for a specified GP (you can certinly ask for a GP of the same gender and get it).
For both of these, you need to stand your ground. You will be suprised how copretive a receptionist can be if you just stand there holding up the queue waiting for her to give you a time.
I agree that practices should be open longer. I think that can be done easily by the goverment spending the money on practices rather than Supermarket GPs and national databases.
The reason apointments are so short is so that GPs can comply with goverment targets. If they dont comply with them, they dont get paid (a lot of money is performance related) and the practice shuts down.
The reason apointments are so short is so that GPs can comply with goverment targets.
Welcome Dave!
That's not entirely true. Appointment lengths are a quirk of history. Indeed, today's 10 minute appointment slots are twice as long as the way it used to be.
Most of us that operate 10 minute appointments are very happy if a patient identifies the need of a longer consultation and books a double slot.
I personally think that 15 minutes is the ideal consultation length, and probably more efficient use of our time as well because we'd get more problems done and dusted there and then.
However, this would raise staff costs dramatically, and as you've pointed out, may actually result in 'access targets' being missed and income being withheld.
As for longer opening hours - no problem as long as the costs are met. We have families and lives as well, and you'll find it very difficult to convince GPs that they should open longer hours on top of what they do already, unless you provide more money for more doctors.
The thing about expanding opening hours was meant to inclue the fact that the money used for the supremarket GP could be used to pay for extra GPs and nurses, therfore extening opeing times, seeing more patients and even being open weekends. I would never want GPs or nurses to work longer than they aready do. There would not be a shortage of applicants who would not mind working 3 hrs a night or weekeds (do it on a rota and they would only need to work 15 hrs a week). More info about it on my blog.
Double book an apointment time? Before I made the receptionist aware of the fact I know my rights, they refused to double book unless I told her why I wanted to see the GP. I would often lie, but that just pissed of the GP!
really there should be some professional training and base lines for medical receptionists, the standard of folk doing this job is dire in the uk, there are many other organisations who do a much better job of training up their customer fronting staff, and many are clearly failures who would not survice 5 minutes working for a free market company that actually monitored and sampled how they treat customers, it surely cannot be beyond the wit of doctors collectively to see this and do something about it? like everything else it would change pdq if the patients really could take their real money spend anywhere they dam well like
as for evening appointments and sat mornings etc, this was fairly common until recently, and is necessary to keep that much let down group of people (the folk who actually work for a living and keep the fucking country solvent) in access to medical care, the money is there in the grand scheme of things its just diverted to no hope politically correct dross and ill thought through mega IT projects which will never deliver end customer results
A&E should not be a walk-in service. That is why you get all these twats with dumb problems like, "They are drunk" swanning into A&E and wasting time and money and probably causing more A&E cases by beating up the whole waiting room.
If you are OK enough to walk to A&E then you don't need to be there - c'mon people! This country is turning into a hell-hole of idiot zombies.
CHAVS can go to HELL.
____
I also am really p'd off with my GP - I went to see her about my breathing problems (I have asthma) and some other weird stomach pains. All she could do was ask me if I took drugs or was up the duff - how dare she? I am NOT a chav and DO NOT have casual relations with anyone. I work full time and have been to University.
MY GP can go to HELL.
_____
What a NANNY state.
My GP might as well let me die, then I wouldn't have to slave away at work just to pay for the CHAVS that the Goverment ALLOWS to bum around and live the life of Riley :/
I sort of agree with some of the stuff said about A&E being used asa walk-in centre. I do however think saying "If you are OK enough to walk to A&E then you don't need to be there..." is a bit much.
I know people that have walk in because someone cut their face with a knife but they did not want to dial 999, others take a taxi. Not all people that walk in to A&E are OK to wait until their GP opens (last time I did that the GP sent me to the hospital and complained I never went in the 1st place!).
GPs will ask people if they are on drugs or expentant because until they actually examin you, they dont know and they dont know if your a chav. even if you went to uni, that does not mean you are not having casual relationships or not taking drugs (think back to your uni days and work out how many students were sleeping around or taking some sort of drug). There might be 15,000 patients at your practice, so you cant expect your GP to know that you are not a chav.
The receptionist at my current practice is OK, she even seems fine with the fact I dont allow her to know any of my medical information (although having said that, she also knows she has no choice and I know my rights).
The IT bit is a valid point, there are loads of us against it and campaigning to stop it BUT that does not make it the fault of the GP that you cant access them at night or weekends, although I think they could do far more and stand up for patients right to access health care and put the 'confidentality' back in the 'doctor=patient confidentality' thing.
Forgot to mention ealrier but my apointment times are 8 mins or less, sorry, but that is not double what it used to be, I used to get betwen 10-15 min, so it is more like halfed, not doubled.
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That's a totally misleading spin you put on the OOH pay rate.
At the time of negotation of nGMS, Simon Fradd (GP lead negotiator) said "it was a bit of a laugh" that they got the GP OOH opt-out for only 6k. In other words, the GPs were only required to give up 6K of their salary to escape the traditional 24/7 responsibility of being a GP.
This was a cock-up by the govt negotiators.
Gareth
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Thanks to author.
Good job!
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