GPs Voting to take Collective Action

Posted on:

Dear patients,

I’m writing to clarify some reports you may have read or heard in the media regarding GPs voting to take collective action. This is true but, as ever, the detail is important.

Firstly, let me emphasise that GPs are on your side. Secondly, I can reassure you that GPs are not striking and general practice is open. If you have a health care need please continue to contact us as usual and we will do our best to help you as we always have done.

Due to increasing pressures and reduced funding we, along with practices across the country and supported by the British Medical Association, are having to slightly change the way we are working. As patient’s health needs become increasingly complex, we need to be able to provide continuity of care and to be able to provide appointments that are long enough to be fair to both patients and GPs. This is likely to mean that we offer fewer appointments each day.

Access to appointments in the Wyre Forest Health Partnership is very good when compared with other practices across the country. The changes that we are making may mean it is a little harder to get an urgent appointment. We are sorry for any inconvenience this causes but we are having to stand with colleagues across the country to protect our patients and protect our practices in the longer term.

We are going to ask the hospital to complete more of their own work instead of passing it on to us to complete in general practice. This will help us to devote more of our time to you, our patients.

Here are some of the reasons that explain why we feel so under-pressure:

  • People are living longer – this is obviously a good thing! But it does lead to more patients, with more medical problems and more frailty.
  • The population is less healthy – people find it harder to access healthy foods and to be physically active because of the pressures of modern society.
  • The inequality gap is growing – there is increasing poverty, this is a barrier to good physical health.
  • GP teams are asked to provide more complex care – for example, prescribe and monitor increasingly complicated medications for specialist conditions.
  • Hospitals and other providers (e.g. mental health teams) have long waiting lists – so we continue to support patients who would previously have been able to access support from specialist teams.
  • The funding awarded to practices has not matched inflation or reflected the increasingly complex care we deliver as outlined above.

The Health Partnership practices are all in a stable position, but others across the country are not as fortunate and 2000 have closed since 2010. This is why we need to work with our colleagues nationally to ask for a fairer system.

This BMA video explains things well:

The partners would like to thank you in advance for your understanding. Please know, we are on your side.

Best wishes,

Dr Tristan Brodie

Chair of the Wyre Forest Health Partnership