The state of the NHS right now is terrifying

[Faciadipasta]

I am feeling genuinely scared for us as a country health care wise. I was reading today about a chap who died of internal bleeding while his family were kept on hold to 999 for 10 minutes as nobody even answered the phone.
Then there are all the people who die while waiting for an ambulance to arrive, because they are all lined up.outside the hospitals unable to offload their patients.
People can't see a GP at all, so there are bound to be loads who are dying of things that could have been prevented if they'd been seen. Waits at A and E are enormous and they don't even have enough chairs so people with serious injuries or illnesses are having to just sit on the floors in the corridors.
We're actually starting to feel like one of those warzone countries that you see on the news and it is scaring me shitless.
I mean even in the US you wouldn't just be left to die because there was nobody to answer the phone although admittedly you'd probably end up bankrupt for paying back the care, but at least you wouldn't be dead!
I personally feel like we have no care, no safety net. And it's scary.
Will it get better? What can be done?

They can take the hour though! Cops can't! I asked them 'so how do you go to the toilet or eat' and they said they have do it while on patrol!

I work 6 days a week and I run a manufacturing business. Built it from scratch.
We wouldn't get anything done if the most important people in the process were part timers.

mobiledesktop
If we insisted GPs work 5 days a week, then we'd have 0 GPs in a very short space of time. Due to all the factors I've listed above.

Hertfordshire

They can take the hour though!

No they can't, you get half an hour unpaid, if you are lucky enough to have time to take it, quite often people end up working through their breaks.

I’m old enough to remember GPs doing house visits and during the night. I think they were a lot more respected when they were a lot more available.

Correct. Capitalism depends on waste, it's a mechanism for restricting supply and thus justifying high prices. Of course the NHS could reduce waste but 1) the idea that that would solve the problem is ludicrous;
2) the error in a system that is is literally concerned with life and death must be biased towards over spend. The alternative is a logical approval of some fatalities due to restricted resources - and we already have enough of those.

No GP actually looks at that anymore. They don't.

Out of interest, saying the Government did get rid of the NHS, how much would it cost people for health insurance, on top of their increased rents/mortgage payments/fuel bills/food bills etc ? How much would companies be expected to pay towards the insurance ?

Your just putting up obstacles to maintain a cushy number. If rules and regs need changing then let's change them.
The British Medical Association wouldn't be happy but then they are very protective of the doctors lifestyle and income.

thenosehasit
On the NHS??
Can I have the name of the practice please so I can send my CV? V close to where I live. Most GP sessions are paid between 8-10k (there is an upper limit of the GP contract as I remember which is around this figure although most practices won't pay that) so the practice you mention is paying 2.5x the upper recommended limit.
Please forward on the practice details as I'd be very ineterested (and am slightly disbelieving)

You are not understanding a GPs admin. It’s not sending thank you notes or filing. It’s interpreting test results and decisions around next steps, it’s safeguarding assessment and referrals, it’s cremation certificates, it’s referral letters for people with suspected cancers and chasing referrals, it’s liaison with ambulance crews, with care homes, with local authorities and more besides.

thenosehasit
No GP looks at what?? Blood results? Of course we do.... And we have to know how to interpret them??
Or ALT specifically?
I'm not putting up obstacles, I'm telling the truth as I see it.
You can stamp your feet and say I'm not working hard enough, but it's simply not true.

@ThirstyMeeples I'm working closely with Hearts & West Essex ICS at the moment so will certainly be raising awareness with them that they have GP's earning £250k yet not doing any of the non-patient facing work such as deciphering tests, writing prescriptions etc etc.

throwingsomecrumbs
😁
They are LIVING THE DREAM

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

And GPs removing tonsils on kitchen tables? Anaesthesia being a slug of brandy?

I’m always surprised that those thinking GPs have a high paid easy life don’t retrain and help ease the massive shortages. They could probably rake in £350k for a ten-hour-week reading the BMJ and drinking coffee.

Not when the bloods have been done at a hospital and have not been requested by the GP practice. I've had GPs question my sanity when I tell them that such and such was low. They also don't appear to be getting and/or reviewing discharge summaries.

I'm fully understanding their "role" Interpreting test results is obviously important but in most cases it's the type of thing a bright 6th former could learn to do.
What I'm saying is let's have admin type roles with a degree of medical training created, to help out.
But they must work a full week. It's only 5 days

Don’t be daft.

Ugh this thread seems to have descended into

• GPs are workshy lazy scroungers
• no GPs work all the hours god sends and regularly need to donate a kidney for their patients. Stop being so ungrateful.

I honestly can't believe that it is GPs themselves that are the problem. They should be able to.work.part time like the rest of the population can choose to do BUT the surgeries need to sort the lack of access out, and hospitals the lack of beds, surely? What do we need to do as a society to make it happen?

Could AI be developed to look at that stuff? I get that to train a person might take years, but could AI manage it?
My fear, with AI (and I (layman) think it could be very useful in healthcare) is that AI will pick up lots of the legwork interpretating test results, and the government would just say 'right, we can cut the number of staff now' so we'd actually be in no better position.

@Mobiledesktop OK< so it's only 5 days. I'm sure most GP's would be more than happy to work a 5 day week of, say, 8 hour days? So, lets stick with 40 hours a week. Again, I am 100% all GP's I know would be cool with this.

The reality is, 8 hour days don't exist. a 5 day week is 5 days of 12-16 hour days.

And where are you getting these mythical GP's to work 70 hours weeks so happily? There is a reason that GP's work 'part time' (though a 3 day week would still work more hours than most full time jobs!)

Thankfully, they deal with actual medicine. There's no such thing as 'alternative medicine.' If it's clinically proven to work, it's medicine. I'd be interested to hear of any methods they should use that they don't that are actually supported by evidence. The things you've listed so far are placebos at best.