To think the NHS makes it difficult to avoid A&E

Its primary care that have destroyed A&E , GPs are private run businesses ( that received NHS funding) and they have gone to shit since this move.

if anyone on this thread truely believes a labour government will solve this in their next term then they are absolutely deluded. It will take years and probably needs to start with the NHS being shut down and then starting again from the beginning .

Where? We are thinking about moving as well

From the Gov website. All your GPs must be partners and not salaried. Means they have expenses that come out of that pot, so it's not their take home pay.

100% agree. They are bleeding this country dry to make money for themselves. They are the nasty party and always will be.

I live in a very rural area. we have a small GP practice with 4 GP's. I take the time to read their annual report. this year they all earned over £100K and are working 2.5 to 3 days per week in the practice. thats all down to tony blair and his doctors contracts. no wonder you cant get an appointment with them. thats why so many people go to a and e in desperation. the system is broken and it needs someone with the balls to stop treating it like some sort of sacred cow and sort out these stupidities.

My GP practice is teetering and getting worse. A big problem is there automatic message which has been left on 'busier than usual if its not urgent please try again tomorrow' for over three years now. Which I think about a lot in relation to a particular care client with the early indications of dementia. Someone who would listen to that, think 'no its not so bad' and hang up ..... and not remember perhaps that this wasn't the first/ third/ tenth time they'd heard that message, potentially tehn having an emergency / A&E condition. I am currently being sent strongly worded reminders about smear tests, but if I were to not ignore that message I'd not be booking a smear, as it CAN wait.

We need more GPs. There are doctors who want to be GPs. But the government decides to cut funding for doctors, yet offer more funding for non doctors (Google ARRS ).

We have enough doctors. We gave a massive need for more doctors. We don't have enough jobs.

12 years ago the NHS was rated as the best health service in the world. Now, it's a total disaster. Wonder why ???

My GP told me to take DD to an and e because she has a stye that won’t shift, because they don’t have any appointments for the next two weeks.

can you imagine!

But the NHS isn’t a business, and it is trying to run it like one (stupid focus on targets not patients, cost cutting tot the bone etc) that got us where we are. Ow. You also would not like medical care to be run as a business, which is ultimately FOR PROFIT. Just look at the US, where people die because they can’t afford healthcare or face a choice between bankruptcy and the debate of a loved one- in a developed country which prides itself on being the best one the world 😂

I'm a GP receptionist, it's frustrating all round. On a Monday morning our appointments for the morning can be gone within 15 minutes of answering the phone asking people to call back in the afternoon when it's not even 9am is hard.

Forgive me for picking out your comment as I'm sure it was an emotional situation. But I don't understand why so many people in the UK have been brainwashed into blindly praising the NHS when they perform a medical service that is absolutely to be expected in a developed country

This 1000%

What the PP described is shockingly poor levels of health provision, wrapped in the inevitable lionisation of “our wonderful NHS”. This is delusional.

The problem with people treating the NHS like an artifice of religious faith is that people just don’t face up to how bad it has become. And because they are ideologically committed to it won’t question anything it does.

The level of primary care service provided by the NHS is now substantially worse in many areas than what was around before its creation and people are in denial about this.

I am ideologically committed to the NHS in some form too but we simply can’t go on like this and people need to have a grown up debate without the polarisation between those who say it should be privatised and those who say it’s perfect and above reproach.

I’m in the South East, where we have had GP Surgery’s merging, with even less appointments available.
we don’t have any walk in centres any near us, no pharmacist prescribers either, no econsult available at our local surgery. I have tried, like many others to call at 8am, only to be told ‘they have reached their safe working limits for today’ & try again tomorrow! They will NOT let you book an appointment whilst you’re stood at reception desk - crazy!
I have the NHS app, but no facility to book an appointment online.
it’s impossible & not fit for service, due to years of negligence by the government!

Also wanted to add that in many European countries there is absolutely no stigma attached to using private healthcare. There are various healthcare plans available and a huge number of "average" middle class families take out private insurance especially after they have children. The costs are not exorbitant in any way, comparable to a mobile phone contract. Having private healthcare is seen as choosing to invest in your family's wellbeing, comparable to spending more money on organic food.

For every family going private, it frees up capacity for people using free healthcare services (technically not free but the costs for that are deducted from everyone's salaries so it makes no difference). That in turn reduces the number of people going to A&E with non-emergencies so everyone receives the right treatment at the right time. A knock-on effect of this is that being a doctor or dentist is seen as a very pleasant and rewarding job. There are usually 10x more applicants to medical universities than there are places so the number of doctors in the community is huge.

There is none of the odd entitlement of refusing to pay for healthcare just because you can and should get it for free on the NHS. Or going private looked down upon as somehow betraying certain political or societal values.

I work for the nhs, but feel the whole service’s aim is to persuade people not to really use it, whatever service they are trying to access. You are always faced with a sign or voicemail asking you to question yourself for using it, or telling you to call or go somewhere else (that often sends you back to the original place (looking at you pharmacies). Thankfully i have not yet been majorly ill but on the infrequent times i have used the local gp I always worry i’ll be seen as taking the piss, even though I’m not, so put off contact and suffer a bit longer than i probably should have. I don’t see this guilting of its users emphasised in such the same way in other countries. i get their services are set up different, but i just hate the overall vibe here currently.

My children or I haven't seen a doctor for years, on the odd chance I have to phone them up it is always a call back and that is always by a pharmacist.
Which the last time one of my children were seen I was told it was shingles (definitely not as the rash was widespread and 2 they have never had chickenpox).
Had to take them to A&E in the end as it was a rash that didn't disappear.
I don't know what the answer is but the current system/recruitment is not working.

Last month 11,000 doctors applied to be GPs. But the government only fund for 4,000. Doctors are being made redundant in favour of less trained PAs.

That why you can't see a GP. We have more than enough doctors, but the government refuse to fund them (this is not about cost as PAs are no cheaper - but they can't prescribe & have less than 2 years training against a GPs 7-10).

More people therefore choose to go private - wonder who owns those companies 🤬

Burns and wounds that need stitches are accidents and should rightly go to accident and emergency. GPs aren't actually funded to deal with accidents. Doing stitches in a 10 minute GP appointment would be impossible.

Sorry to hear about your DH. I agree an admission could potentially have been avoided with timely treatment. Not only is it an awful experience for the patient but think about the cost of admission. Our current healthcare system cuts off its own nose to spite it's face.

at one time a and e was a last resort or somewhere you went with major injury heart attacks etc. You ring the GP now dead on 8 and you are 26th on line so you know you won't get apt probably not even a phone call from a GP. The surgery opens at 8.30 so if you turn up in person all apts have gone.
our local pharmacist is useless even the GPs tell you not to bother just use online ones instead. there is a small hospital in town but any more than a sticking plaster you have to go 30-plus miles for an a and e which is way overpacked like most people it is a good 16-hour or more wait

Same. My GP is brilliant.

It can be done.

I know people nearby with the same problem as the op. Ending up in a and e.

We need a GP service a long side A&E we have one at the hospital near us, wait times are lower and people are triaged to The GP service

I absolutely agree OP.

Further to my post below, the added delight of the 1.4 million immigrant inflow is that the surgery I have been at for years, now tell me that I am 500 m outside their geographical boundary and due to "population inflow" as they describe it, they can no longer have me and the family as patients. I will be deregistered in 30 days!!. So I have to then go to the hassle and upset of re registering with one down the road.

The laugh is as a result, new surgery have now implemented same system, so my friend is being kicked out to register at surgery I've come from. So another NHS beaurocratic merry go round