IN seeking to blame the current NHS crisis on general practitioners, the government is conveniently forgetting that GPs deal with 90 per cent of all patient contacts with the NHS (including the winter months), and secondly, that there is a severe national shortage of GPs such that many GP surgeries are struggling to maintain even a normal weekday service.

The promise of more medical school places is a long term solution.

We already operate ‘extended’ opening hours from 7.30am to 6.30pm but actually work much longer to deal with all the clinical administration (hospital letters, referrals, pathology results etc) generated by patient care.

Also, outside of normal surgery hours, there is and always has been a local GP on-call service.

Contrary to government and Daily Mail misinformation, GP surgeries do not close at midday.

The reality is that this is when we make home visits (yes, GPs still do home visits every day!).

Many of our patients and particularly those who are seriously ill and the very elderly, cannot get to the surgery.

Hospitals are struggling for many reasons.: some patients actually need to be in hospital.

Our population is growing and the proportion of elderly is increasing.

Reducing the number of in-patient beds and shutting hospitals (the much loved Christchurch Hospital is a case in point) due to funding restraints, only compounds the problem.

As a GP who also works one session a week in our local accident department I know only too well that the most depressing sight is sick patients waiting to be seen on trolleys in corridors, temporarily looked after by the paramedic crews who brought them in and who could/should be back on the road.

Blaming GPs for our present NHS crisis maybe a convenient scapegoat, but not only is this inaccurate but further lowers the morale of an overstretched, highly qualified and dedicated but diminishing team of doctors.

DR PETER PERKINS FRCGP, MRCS

Southbourne Surgery, Bournemouth

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