to think that people don't realise how tough it is being a GP?

[naima99]

My dad is a GP. He used to love his job, got home at a reasonable time and had more time to spend with his patients.

Now, he regularly gets to work at 7am and leaves at 9:30pm. He has no time for lunch a lot of the time. He hates that he doesn't have the time he used to have for his patients. He gets tonnes of abuse when he's running late but isn't allowed to say that he's late because his last patient was having a suspected heart attack in front of him, or that he had a child in front of him with undiagnosed diabetes whose life was in danger etc. He's lost so many staff members because they're all fed up. He has no life outside of work because he is working on the weekends as they're so short staffed.

He knows so many doctors in the same position.

Now I'm not claiming that GPs are heroes or deserve any more than the rest of us, but I hear them being slated so so much.

People get angry that they can't get an appointment, that the GP only let them talk about two medical conditions in a 10 minute appointment, that google told them something different so the GP must be wrong which results in complaints or anger directed towards them. I was on a conference call the other day when my colleagues randomly started slaying GPs and them not seeing people face to face during covid saying they need to 'man up'

I don't know if IABU to think that a lot of people don't quite understand that appointments in the surgery are such a small part of being a GP, and that it is a pretty gruelling job at times. Maybe I am just being protective over my dad as I can see him falling apart in front of me.

Does anyone agree or AIBU?

I think they are financially compensated for the risks and antisocial hours. There are many jobs on zero hours contracts, with more antisocial hours that only pay minimum wage. GPs have job security and good pensions too.

@Viviennemary they get paid very little in Britain relative to how much time they spend studying and workload. The average is under six figures.

I have a huge amount of respect for GPs, I have several chronic conditions and without my previous GP would still be going around unaware. Of course there are good and bad GPs.

In relation though, many, many, surgeries are poorly run and as a result underperform and are inefficient. It's often the GPs that bear the brunt of this.

[quote EmperorCovidula]@Viviennemary they get paid very little in Britain relative to how much time they spend studying and workload. The average is under six figures.[/quote]
Many GPs work the system. They work part time NHS (1-2 days a week) retain their pension and work private practise 3/4 days a week. Doing this would net £200k+ a year, plus a nice government pension. The government made this possible, which is why Most GPs work part time, and why you can never see ‘your’ GP.

@naima99

my dad hates the status. When people ask him what he does he tells them he's a drug dealer for a laugh then obviously corrects them. He would rather people didn't know he was a GP though as he just ends up being questioned about their medical problems
Why don't you suggest he just says he's in the Civil Service? It must wear thin never being able to switch off at social events.

Lots of posters referring to GPs working in private practice. I’m a GP. I literally have no idea what this private practice is. I know no GPs working in private practice (do you mean as a private GP? There aren’t many of these around).
Also not one of my friends earn more than £80k as a GP and currently there are many locums claiming benefits as there simply is no work at the moment.

worried I think they've seen an advert for PushDoctor and concocted a fantasy world in their head where their GP toddles off to sit in a sun lounger 3½ days a week and dole out Viagra and antibiotics over video-conferencing.

I think the issue is that we have set GPs up as the "gatekeepers" of healthcare. They specialise in general health (clue's in the name), but so many people really need to see an expert in their own condition.

Naima, I understand very well what a difficult job GP's have, it must be particularly hellish at the moment too, so frustrating. Things will improve and your dad will feel better, bless him.

worriedwellworrier Tue 23-Jun-20 04:40:22
Lots of posters referring to GPs working in private practice. I’m a GP. I literally have no idea what this private practice is.
......
I worked in Harley Street part time and knew one GP with a thriving private practice but that was 25 years ago. GP's would occasionally have a private patient whom they would see out of normal surgery hours, generally someone who used to be on their list but moved further away and still wanted to stay with same doctor.

Most GPs are entirely NHS, extremely stretched and not over paid.

@pokehuman and @Lynda07 I will absolutely love to hear about this private practice . Not GP’s who are heroes in my opinion . The main problem is the chronic underfunding and cuts to services by successive governments, closing of hospital beds , lack of funding of community services etc . I would not be a GP if you paid me millions . It is a difficult job and underpaid . They should all emigrate to Canada which is what a lot of them are doing so they can have a semblance of work life balance.

Well, my last GP was incredibly prejudical towards mental illness, believes you can will your way out of it, and abruptly took me off a medication I've been stable on for over a decade, triggering a massive crisis. In my experience very few GPs have any understanding of anorexia or addiction and see them both as a form of bad behaviour, so yes, I judge them quite harshly. I'm a doctor myself, incidentally, albeit not a medical one, so obviously not a complete idiot, but that's precisely how GPs have treated me ever since I got the stigmatised diagnosis of anorexia as a biracial teenage girl - as a disobedient idiot. Perhaps your father is a fantastic GP. But personally, I've never met one.

The problems with how GPs is that when their contracts were renegotiated a few years ago they got a big salary increase and managed to remove on call / weekend work. Since then lots of people have come into the profession (usually women) and work part time as it suits their lifestyle to do so. I have lots of friends who are GPS and work part time (Ranging from 1 - 3 days a week) as it is so stressful and they don’t need any more money. The bigger picture is though if all qualified GPs only work a few days a week, there is going to be a massive shortage And the job is going to be v stressful. So if all GPs were forced to work say 4 days a week overnight the stress In the job would reduce but that’s not going to happen...

Most of the GPs I have encountered need to learn to listen so patients will talk, talk so patients will listen.

DD had a phone consultation with GP recently and said it was the first time she felt that the doctor had actually listened. Got the treatment she needed after being fobbed off many times and is now well.

IME too many GPs treat what they see rather than what the patient is talking about.

And YY to actually understanding gynaecological issues. Too many GPs IME fob off these issues.

I went for many years with slowly increasing anaemia which got ignored until I had an unrelated blood issue. Turned out the problem was fibroids but would never have been diagnosed if it hadnt been for the crisis caused by the unrelated blood issue.

Move over teachers, it's the turn of GPs to be bashed now.

for all the amazing GPs out there, especially the lovely one who phoned me and listened for about twenty minutes after my Dad died.

There are many jobs which are bloody hard work and don't pay the same money as GPs receive.

Being a doctor for the nhs is absolutely awful. I genuinely don't know why anyone does it anymore. I suppose they just want to help people and feel like they are abandoning the NHS if they leave.

We left for Australia a few years ago and have never looked back. You pretty much do your contracted hours, you are allowed special leave to do training schemes (that's on top of your annual leave), you get paid overtime (yes, really) and the hospitals/clinics have appropriate staffing levels so you don't feel like you're endangering people's lives when you go for a quick wee at some point during your shift.

Neither myself, nor my DH, would ever work for the NHS again. I feel sad saying that but I don't see why doctors and nurses should have to be "heroes" or martyrs. That's a really dangerous culture and it's just a fancy PR spin to excuse employee abuse and unacceptable working conditions.

General practices are businesses and independent contractors to the NHS with a nationally negotiated contract (for the business, not for individuals) - it is a peculiar legal status that comes with some perks and some drawbacks.
The big salary increase if some years back is a myth (as is ‘private practice 😆’), it wasn’t an increase to a salary but a restructure of the medical services contract.
Not all GPs are ‘salaried’ either and many of the partners that own and run the ‘business’ end up with a lot less pay than the non-partner GPs that works for them but do a lot of the background work that the running of a business needs, deal with the government/NHS directives etc.
I have worked with many, many GPs over the years and in the main, they work incredibly hard. They are hugely undervalued yet end up with getting a lot of the stick for what is wrong with the whole system.
Totally with you OP x

And while UK-trained doctors go off to work in Australia, the UK shortage means needing to employ more foreign-trained doctors here, which means the countries they came from lose out on bright young minds. It's a mess.

I think if used to be a softer option years ago but completely agree now. Our local GPs are brilliant and I say that as someone fairly hacked off with the western medicine model. I can’t fault ours. They do mainly work four days but if they can then they should as the days seem pretty pressured

Some are good and some are bad and then some are so bad they put your life in danger just like the GP who missed my brothers cancer but the second opinion GP found it with the same examination within seconds.

@naima99 So you'd be annoyed if you were a GP and a woman on maternity leave with no one else to care for her baby brought him to the appointment? What else is she meant to do with the baby? And given that she already has an appointment for herself, does it make sense to wait on the phone for twenty mins trying to bet an emergency appointment for the baby with a different GP at a different time of day on the same day, necessitating two trips to the surgery and, most of all, waiting time, because the two problems can actually both be dealt with in 10 mins if you don't spend most of the time complaining about your life and banging on about process instead of doing medicine.

The only time I've ever heard a flinty note of happiness in my GP's voice was when I had a phone consultation during the early part of the pandemic. Because she wasn't seeing patients any more.

In my GP surgery in central London there are seven GPS, mostly quite young. I feel quite sorry for them because I have the impression that they've gone into medicine to please their parents and because it's perceived culturally as a prestigious career. But they're all crap doctors, from the senior practice founder who had 'forgotten' how to give a baby an injection but had to have a go (bloody mess) after they lost their practice nurse, to the one who diagnosed my husband with a hernia when he had something completely different thereby wasting a referral, to the one who refused to prescribe me an antidepressant I'd taken for years (including while breastfeeding) because I was breastfeeding.

Younger GPs increasingly seem to be working part time because of the pressure and hours. None of them seem to have any interest in being a partner. I would think there’ll be a crisis when the current partners retire.

I’m a hospital consultant and have many friends who are GPs. We’re in Ireland though, so structure and terms are somewhat different.

But I would hate to be a GP. Mind you, sometimes I hate my job too. The expectations from the general public are sometimes ridiculous. There was a thread on here a few months ago from a woman who accosted her GP in a car park and expected the GP to engage with her and give an opinion about her child, specifically an opinion on what another professional had said/done in relation to the child. This was at a time when the GP had not seen the child for a week or so, had obviously worked in that week and seen many more patients, a good few of whom were likely more urgent than the poster’s child, did not have access to the notes, hadn’t seen the communication from the specialist and finally, was stressed herself as was leaving work to deal with her own sick child. Yet the op came on here bitching and moaning about the fact the gp didn’t stop to have a conversation about it all and offer an opinion (for which the op would no doubt have held her professionally accountable). And lots of people backed the op up and slated the GP.

One aspect of my life that I hate is that people will stop me in the supermarket etc and expect me to talk to them about their health issues. It’s invasive and intrusive. Likewise, at social events. Once people find out you’ve a medical job, they tell you their experiences/conditions/their neighbours saga etc. It’s wearying.

And I totally agree that the daily mail et al have done a number on what people think GPs earn. People haven’t a clue, nor have they a clue what behind the scenes costs and work there is. I remember finishing a morning clinic once around lunchtime and as I showed the last patient out he saw the empty waiting room and said “oh you’re finished for the day now”. My working day actually finished almost 30 hours later, as I was on call that night, and no, that’s not being paid to sleep, as one pp put it, as firstly it’s not paid and secondly we’re not sleeping, but I’ve no doubt that patient went off thinking I had a great life, finished for the day at 1.30.

It isn't a normal job so why should they get paid a normal wage? For someone as highly skilled they do not earn shitloads in comparison to gps in other countries. People see £70k and think that is a huge amount and compared to the average wage it is but if you actually think about the training, constant need to update skills and the important decisions they have to make in a 10-15 minute session then it is justified. A newly qualified gp is very unlikely to be earning £100k. To be a gp you have to train incredibly hard. Five years at medical school which is grueling, then another two years as a junior doctor (in an understaffed, overwhelmed hospital) before embarking on another three years training whilst doing endless exams, accreditations, cpd whilst working a full time job. Getting a gp training job is through a point based application which means candidates can end up in different parts of the country from where they live.

They are not valued or respected enough for the job that they do.