GPs leaving the UK

[Traveller3367]

DP is a HCP with lots of doctor friends.
In less than 2 years, 6 GPs have left the UK to work abroad (or are imminently leaving).
I read in the papers that 1 GP can care for upto 2000 patients so that's 12000 patients who have lost out.
AIBU to think there must be something about job that's driving them away?
The papers make it out to be easy and well paid but clearly not easy/well paid enough for some to stay and do it!
How can we keep our GPs in the UK to help us?

Well I know of one who moved to Oz - better terms and life style

I work with GPs and the job is awful at the moment; the workload is huge, they are overstretched and, partly due to the media, they are subjected to lots of complaints and aggression from patients. All of those I know are stressed and some are close to burnout.
I can honestly say things are just as bad for many allied healthcare professionals, the biggest difference is that most of us don't have the escape routes to go abroad the GPs do

I've no idea which papers make it out to be easy and well paid but I should stop reading them.

Average GP salaries are shown on practice websites. The average opinion columnist at a national paper would weep blood if asked to live on the same money.

GP's are well paid

I have a friend who works 3 days a week and takes home £106k.

That is a good salary to me. She doesn't complain at all about it.

Off they pop then. I won't notice the difference as it has been easier to spot a large pile of rainbow coloured unicorn shit than a working GP.

I'm sure plenty (most with a skin in the race) will come along to say differently.

Others however, will speak the truth.

My GP friends tell me that the problem is the 15 min consultation, the lack of clinical autonomy and excess paperwork.
After spending 5 years at Medical School then 3 years GP speciality Training they resent being pen-pushers and collecting statistics for central government.

My previous GP said she had enough when she was asked to personally handle 75-100 patients a day alone, and only ‘allowed’ to actually see 7 - the rest she was told she had to phone, or video call or she’d face a disciplinary . Wasn’t allowed breaks and zero support and working from 5am through til 1am some days.

Damn bloody shame that she’s left general practice now, as she was an absolutely incredible GP who would do and always did do anything for her patients, she went far far beyond the call of duty in her job .

I live in Aus and know a lot of uk doctors who trained on the nhs and moved here. It’s better paid and the hours are fewer. They also don’t have to work shifts.

@WomanWithDiamondEarring
“ Off they pop then. I won't notice the difference as it has been easier to spot a large pile of rainbow coloured unicorn shit than a working GP.

I'm sure plenty (most with a skin in the race) will come along to say differently.

Others however, will speak the truth.”

And as you’re clearly not a GP how on earth would you know what the “truth” of the job is??

If it’s such an easy, cushy, well paid job surely they don’t would just be lying back basking in it rather than leaving the profession and/or country?

For more people to take more responsibility for their own health. Not drink and smoke themselves into illness. Not be obese.

Can you imagine sitting and listening to patients with self inflicted conditions, asking for help every day. Knowing that what will make them better is to stop the awful diets, lifestyles etc and knowing that while the GP does his best, the customer (patient) is going straight home to light up, get their alcohol/fry-up fix and spend 7 hours with sofa/tv.

It must be so depressing.

@terrifiediamgoingtodie Wow that poor GP. To be working from 5am til 1am is almost unbelievable. Do you know what your GP does now? Did she leave medicine or go abroad?

I agree with most of the comments above. I started this thread after a conversation with DP about the number of threads about lack of appointments and after seeing an article about how only half appointments were with GPs nowadays. Hard to see how things will get better unless the government start offering more attractive working packages?
Sounds like money is not the issue but working hours and red tape.
Such a shame as I have seen how medical care works in foreign countries without primary care.
Whilst it sounds lovely to be able to go straight to a specialist, if it's a different problem then the specialist often just washes his/her hands and the patient is left stuck for where to go next. So many different things can cause pain in the same aeas that many will probably throw away £££ seeing specialist A when it should be specialist B they need. Makes me sad when people don't understand this and make throwaway comments like @WomanWithDiamondEarring

@Kummerspeck
Very interesting point about allied healthcare professionals. I can imagine some patients aren't very pleasant when having to see a nurse practitioner instead of a GP etc even though they are adequately qualified to treat patients

@WomanWithDiamondEarring

Off they pop then. I won't notice the difference as it has been easier to spot a large pile of rainbow coloured unicorn shit than a working GP.

I'm sure plenty (most with a skin in the race) will come along to say differently.

Others however, will speak the truth.

You work as a GP do you? Get stuffed. If people work 60 hour weeks as "part time" while being paid fuck all (the media lies about this) and is treated like shit by the media while everyone tells them they just need to work harder then maybe yes they will go overseas If you can find a GP who comes on here and says their life is cruisy and they get £250k working for the NHS then go for it Your tiny mind clearly can't comprehend that maybe the GPs are not the problem If you don't have enough GPs, then however hard they work everyone won't be able to get an appointment with them

@MintJulia do you actually know any GPs or any other doctors in medical specialties?

They are fed up of dealing with social problems particularly poor social housing and benefit problems that cause mental health issues as well as physical illnesses.

They can write supportive letters to councils etc but they find in a 8 year period fuck all changes for the patients particularly children they do that for.

@WomanWithDiamondEarring
All 6 GPs at the surgery I go to have worked throughout the pandemic; and I don’t know if any at the other practices within the consortium didn’t, but I don’t think they (barring taking leave of various sorts as necessary & appropriate, obviously) did. Certainly GPs were doing Covid jabs at the surgery in the consortium that acted as a vaccination centre for all the surgeries that belong to it.

Distinct lack of rainbow unicorn poop though. Just the standard police horse leavings - & of course people do talk a lot of shite online, hue of which I’d never considered

(Shite clearly including forgetting what you were after writing half-way through doing so & ending up with a garbled phrase. The meaning may be clear, but the English is diabolical. )

Very interesting points about managing poor lifestyle and dealing with social problems. Must be so frustrating!
I speak as the child of a lifelong smoker and even my sympathy runs short when he keeps smoking despite multiple smoking related problems. Must be challenging to see it so often in the day especially with all the abuse and "your not working hard enough" thrown in

@LaurieFairyCake

GP's are well paid

I have a friend who works 3 days a week and takes home £106k.

That is a good salary to me. She doesn't complain at all about it.

I call BS

Employed GPs are usually on around £10k per session which would be £100k for a 5 day week. Perfectly reasonable money for a highly qualified professional who makes big decisions all day.

Partners may earn more but if so would spend significant extra time running the business and if calculated, their hourly rate is often less than employed GPs.

For your friend to take home £106k she'd have to be earning £150k before tax and they doesn't happen for 3d per week. Even if you meant £105k gross that's also not realistic.

DH is a GP and has left his permanent, salaried role at a practice because the workload was horrendous.12 hr days with no lunch break, and they worked from the same list which was shared by all the GPs - but some put in less effort than others, meaning some Dr's workload was doubled (inc his), and he felt patient care was suffering, along with his own mental health. He left and now works as a locum, 4 days a week, and although there are downsides, like never being in the same place and travelling further sometimes which adds a couple of hours into his day at either end, it does mean he gets to leave the practice problems/paperwork behind at the end of the day and although that doesn't sit completely well with him, his own mental health is FAR better, and he is better able to look after the patients.

It also pays much better - the most well remunerated position so far was £900 per day. It was a role in an unpopular place though, and you need extra qualifications above those of a standard GP.

As others have said, the stress and burnout of GPs is something of a crisis now. But what will work to improve the situation? DH doesn't see a major change coming any time soon.

Being a GP means you can work anywhere in the world. Why wouldn’t you travel and gain experience to work and live elsewhere?? If I could, I would. (But I have a unskilled unprofessional job so other countries don’t really need me…!)

@MintJulia

For more people to take more responsibility for their own health. Not drink and smoke themselves into illness. Not be obese.

Can you imagine sitting and listening to patients with self inflicted conditions, asking for help every day. Knowing that what will make them better is to stop the awful diets, lifestyles etc and knowing that while the GP does his best, the customer (patient) is going straight home to light up, get their alcohol/fry-up fix and spend 7 hours with sofa/tv.

It must be so depressing.

I’d hope that a GP would have at least a very basic level of psychological insight - at least to the level of being able to recognise that for many people the drivers behind their smoking, drinking and obesity are complex, often linked to MH problems (that the NHS won’t offer adequate treatment for), poverty and societal factors, and not merely a matter of people being stupid or lazy. When you’re dealing with sick and worried people, a basic level of empathy is necessary too.

In my experience many GPs do have this, though I can imagine the working conditions make it difficult to maintain.

Yes I meant £106 gross

Her job is AWFUL - as described by others above, meant to deal with up to 70 patients a day plus 3 hours at the end of the day sending scripts through - last time I saw her she was at the practice at 1am still sending scripts through. She'd been in since 7am - so when I say 'part time' I mean about 50 hours in 3 bloody days - just horrendous working conditions.

My Dh is a teacher and it's much the same - 15 hour days but well paid at £80k - he's leaving teaching in three weeks after 20 years as it's SO bad - his health is shot to shit after all this work (he's never taken a day off in 20 years! And he's now got long Covid because of government failures in schools)

Just because a job is decently paid doesn't mean the working conditions are tolerable

The only reason the NHS functions at all is because the gatekeepers at the sharp end are so highly qualified. As we find when trying to patch it up with 111 etc. I like 111, it's accessible and a good idea but they HAVE to send tons of people to A&E because they're not clinically skilled enough to make judgment calls.

My friend who retired as a GP at 50 in the summer and said it was because of the heart sink patients increasing so much.

Heart Sink patients have always been there - those that come in and you know they are really suffering - physically but often mentally - and you know there is nothing you can do as the cause of their problem is poverty/over work/poor housing/lack of access to basic facilities/the daily overwhelm and the help they need is simply not available or has an incredibly long waiting list.

She said 10 - 20 years ago this was around 20% of patients - in the last 10 years this and increased to well over 50% of people and since Covid has had days where it felt like every single patient she saw was a heart sink patient.

She just could no longer handle being faced with this day after day after day knowing there was little to nothing she could offer that would help.

She took some time off to recover and in the new year plans on looking for work with some kind of anti-poverty campaign or charities as she feel that tackling this is the most important issue that society is facing. The NHS is being used as a sticking plaster for a massive level of societal failings and the money being used for this is taking away from the medical care they are able to offer everyone.

She is just one GP but i suspect many feel the same.

I used to be a GP in the UK, I left 8 years ago. I am still in contact will colleagues in the UK and the situation has significantly deteriorated since I left.

Greater national population,
Greater rate of GP consultations per patient per year,
Increased bounce back of patients to GP as hospitals limited care due to covid.

All leading to greater demand year on year on year.
Increasing demand for instant care, people calling after having a headache for 30 minutes without even taking paracetamol, or verruca demanding same day assessment as an emergency.
Patients contacting GPs for non medical problems e.g. housing, heating etc etc etc.
Reduced income for the practice as a whole which pays all staff/supplies etc, yet increased costs of running practices, many already running on razor thin margin profits to remain in the black.
Quoted figures for GP partner income should effectively have 25% lopped straight off the top as they pay both the employee and employer pension contributions.

Reducing numbers of GPs per population due to failure of recruitment to train new GPs (not an attractive job space), increase in part time working due to burn-out, increase in emigration due to burn out.

My opinion looking from outside in Australia, is of an aggressive, vindictive, population who blame the individuals for the failing of the system depsite individual members of the team, Drs, Nurses and admin team burning themselves out to try and meet demand with a government running a agenda to privatise by setting up the NHS to fail.