To ask if you would pay for GP visits

[justanotherhappyflunkie]

Been talking with various friends who all agree they would rather pay a nominal sum to see a GP rather than the current system.

I have lived in a country that does this (free for children, disabled people, discounts for beneficiaries and long term sickness) and it was great. Same day appointments, good range of doctors, quick referrals.

The UK equivalent of this would be around £20 per visit.

AIBU to suggest it is the system that could help the NHS? prepares for a flaming!

Yep I live in Jersey and we pay for Gp. Not anyone on benefits or low income but the general population do.

same day appointments, low stressed GP and if you’re referred to the hospital it’s all free after that. But just having that fee makes time wasters maybe pause before just not showing up without cancelling. Or booking an appointment because they’re bored.

Yup I would pay £20 or more for a doctors appointment. Pay a lot more already to have a dentist appointment.

"If other countries successfully run such a system then I dont see why we can't"

It is a question of priorities and competence. Jeremy Hunt, an ardent supporter of the free market and private healthcare, was Secretary of State for Health and Social Care from 2012 to 2018. The mismanagement and poor decision-making under his watch is now working its way through the system in the form of too few doctors (he pissed off the junior doctors by imposing pay and conditions on them, so many left the NHS), too few nurses (Hunt scrapped the bursary in 2015), too little investment in equipment and facilities - and of course, by ignoring the findings of the Cygnus simulation, the UK was in no state to deal with the predicted pandemic when Covid actually arrived.

That Hunt is now in charge of the purse strings and is adamant that there is no money available to rectify the terrible mistakes made is an insult to every hard-working person in the NHS and in social care, and to the thousands of patients waiting hours for an ambulance, days for a GP appointment and months for a hospital appointment.

Yeah, I would. Haven't needed to see a GP for years so it wouldn't cost me much.

they introduced this in Germany (you had to pay once per quarter) and it resulted in too much admin, not enough money coming in to make it worthwhile, and people didn't go to the doctor when they needed to because they couldn't afford it.

So it was scrapped.

What i think the most urgent thing the NHS needs right now is:

• people to be more self-sufficient in recognising the symptoms of colds, and administering their own treatments that they can buy in the drugstore/chemist

• use the pharmacist as well as going to the GP for minor ailments

• not rushing to A&E as soon as they have an out of hours cold

• knowing how to use the NHS hotline (101? 111?)

• as far as possible not carrying on as though everything is ok when they have coughs, colds and worse (maybe more handwashing, masking up, not going to work if they can avoid it etc)

At the same time the NHS needs to try to standardise the systems/processes, GPs same.

there are no easy, and certainly no cheap, answers. Going private will help the individual but bottom line? it takes resources from the NHS, since it is the same doctors.

@Brefugee I agree with all of that except the not going to work. Loads of people in the UK get no proper sick pay and get penalised for being off sick. So people come in much more ill than just having a cold. I have worked with people who keep going to the toilets to vomit.

"Yup I would pay £20 or more for a doctors appointment."

What happens if your GP decides that all of the appointments available next week should be given to people who cannot afford £20? Will you demand to be prioritised? Will you up your bid to £30, or £40, or £75 ... thus making doctors' appointments a commodity that can be sold to the highest bidder?

Or are you saying that you'd happily pay £20 per appointment so that everyone can access healthcare whenever they need it (assuming that millions of GP appointments can be magically created overnight)?

If millions of people would happily pay £20 for an appointment, why do the media and Conservative cheerleaders scream every time an increase in taxes is proposed? Or are the many people on here saying that they would happily pay really saying that they would only do so if it meant that they got priority?

I agree with all of that except the not going to work.

which is why i actually wrote "not going to work if they can avoid it"

but because of the shitty sick pay (etc etc) you all should join a union.

@Brefugee I agree with you. Totally sick of how employers treat people in this country.

I think we can all agree with current system doesn't work.

I'm opposed to raising taxes to throw more money at it. There needs to be a fundamental review of all NHS spending before it's given any more of our money surely?

And yes any pay as you go scheme won't make more GPs appear. We all need to drastically reduce how many times we use a GP where possible. By the amount of people alrea do using private schemes

Sorry message cut off

By the amount of people already using private schemes they've already had enough of the NHS. it would be a lot worse if they didn't!

So when dentistry charges were first introduced in England they were very low. Eye tests used to be free as well.
But dentistry charges have risen, and what the government pays dentists have reduced. So hardly any dentists offer NHS treatment. Pushing most people into private dentists.
The conservatives want to do the same with GPs, so in ten years time anyone who can afford it has a private GP and everyone else just goes without.

the oldies among us can remember when the Dentist was just like the GP. Free at the point of use. Private dentistry for cosmetic ones (white fillings, braces etc) was available. Eye tests were free.

So how it now is with dentists? that is how GPs will be as this pp said.

Here in Germany, if the GP prescribes something that will be cheaper if you get it privately, they will give you a private prescription that you pay. Prescriptions are charged by the pack size of what you get (it's complicated for me, easy for the pharmacist) and i usually pay EUR 5 per item.

If everyone who could afford it went private what would happen? the number of GP or hospital appointments would go down because there isn't an infinite number of doctors or appointments, and those that are now on the NHS would just be reallocated as private.

some pp mentioned a GP charging for the early appointments because they go to people who need to go to work and evryone else doesn't? utter rot. In general people who work but have little spare cash for fripperies like GPs tend to have less autonomy over their working hours than those further up the greasy pole. So it should be the other way round. How are you going to police that? Or just give the slots to the highest bidder? or have surge pricing like Uber?

calm down dear, the system works fine now with private dentists doesn't it, where they charge a certain amount and their customers pay it. They don't suddenly decide to prioritise people who can't pay their set price. Or suddenly decide to double their price or ask people to bid what they are prepared to pay for a filling.

Brilliant post! At last!

No, I wouldn't support it and suspect it would cost the NHS more in the long run when people wait until things are critical before seeking help.
I would, however, support a rise in NI and keeping the NHS free at the point of access.

The thing is you mention that people on benefits, disabled, children etc wouldn't have to pay, what about those low middle earners who are struggling at the moment? They aren't in receipt of any benefits, aren't disabled and are working, what if they don't have £20 to visit the doctor? The people who are doing those fairly low paid service type jobs we rely on and are paying in via ni already are charged again. So if they can't afford it, what do they do?

I am not one of these people, I can afford it, but this isn't how I want our healthcare system to run. If you want to go private that option already exists for you, go private, pay a premium, the thing is many working people right now just couldn't afford it, even if it is "only £20". So no.

@Twiglets1 Do you know the terrible state of many poor people's teeth?

No, I don't support the creation of a two tier system for access to NHS healthcare at all.

Threads like this just show how utterly clueless the vast proportion of the population is on who uses healthcare and why. It makes me sick to my stomach after 20 years in the NHS what attitudes like this will do to about 75% of healthcare users I treat.

If you say that people can be exempt if they are children, disabled, poor or have a chronic condition, you're looking at about 3% of people paying.

Not even worth the admin costs.

@scoobelopey I agree. I just hope we get a Labour government before this government do much more damage than they already have.

Well it’s obviously not unlimited but very few people would need to see a GP multiple times in a month. For the average family that might need a few visits a year this would be a great service. The fact that you immediately jump to ‘unlimited’ in your mind is indicative of the problem we have which is that some people massively overuse the health service unnecessarily and others are very light users.

Entirely agree with this. I mean I could afford to pay- and in fact rarely go for myself - but many couldn’t, and it’s the thin end of the wedge. The point of the NHS is it’s free at the point of care for all - it’s available to all and doesn’t punish anyone for being ill.

Some people don’t even have £10 to spend on a GP appointment, even if they could claim it back.

I fear this would put people off making appointments especially if money is tight

If so you’re right it’s not worth it. Plus those paying will more likely feel the burden.

Are we that much different to other countries who pay?