Why are GPs so protected?

[BiggerBoat1]

Can anyone explain to me why GPs still aren't seeing patients face to face.? All other services seem to be back up and running and in my doctor's surgery the Practice Nurse and Midwife are seeing people as normal.

Dentists are back up and running as are opticians etc. I am a teacher so I have been expected to be in a classroom with 30 children at a time for months.

I asked the receptionist today at my GP surgery when they would be back to normal and she looked at me like I'd grown two heads and said "Not any time soon. We still have the Covid". Is it just me or are GPs being protected to a ridiculous extent?

@Badbadbunny pay is a signal of power balance though. BTW, what do you think PT and FT for a GP partner involves?

Is GP bashing the new teacher bashing?

I'm married to a GP and to be honest, primary care is just curled up in foetal position, gasping for breath. I'm not here to bash GPs in the least. Why would I? But realistically, it's a skeletal service rendered even more so by the pandemic.
I have to say, I am fed up to the back teeth of DH running his clinics from home, so much of it is still done over the phone. He's dealing with so many more deaths than ever before (in the years we've been together, at least) courtesy of patients just lingering at home, unable to get in and see the GP, unable to access secondary care because referrals are being rejected left, right, and centre... or they can't get an appointment for months on end and when it finally comes up, it's cancelled and moved again and again.
It's all fine and large to say 'oh, the GPs triaging patients separates the wheat from the chaff and filters out the 'useless' patients.'
Well, it doesn't. Many of these 'useless, time wasters' for patients end up in critical care or dead. It's tragic, utterly tragic and I find it really, really, really hard to feel any love for the NHS, which is a first for me. I've always waved its flag. And no, this doesn't mean I'd love an alternative. I just want a functioning NHS like everyone else. It's on its knees.
I'm a cardiac patient. I have a rare condition that puts me at risk of a sudden heart attack. I get tested to monitor my condition. But then I don't get to actually see my consultant about the results for 6 months, which is pretty much useless. The thing about my risk is that it's an acute thing when it goes wrong and needs to be addressed within a week or two. So I end up in A&E. Sitting with my consultant going over outdated tests from 6 months ago then arranging new ones because she can't go by the previous ones a) isn't going to help me much and b) is a huge waste of time and money. I'm not whining just for the sake of it, but my voice is among a chorus of people who need care to be in real-time. And although that's always going to be an issue with the NHS, it is worse than you can imagine at this present time. And it's not going to fix itself and get better, ever really.

I don't see any GP bashing just people like myself who are bemused about the lack of access to what should be front line basic care.

Gp's were told earlier this year to start seeing patients again.

Have you seen the figures reported with regards to the huge increase of deaths in peoples homes?

It's also not necessarily down to them seeing more patients, but more appointments given to the same patient. Four appointments for an asthma review over the phone and counting is crazy when normally this would be one f2f and a possible follow up over the phone.

Imagine if A&E also said fuck it, we are going to offer triage only over the phone.

I've also had a lump that needed to be seen. Saying over the phone it's the size of my hand doesn't really work does it?

I record all these phone appointments, which they know, and it's shocking to hear them saying you need to be seen, but we aren't doing f2f. I started doing this as A&E and Consultants were questioning why I'm not seeing the GP and I was getting fed up of the implications that I am not doing enough and leaving it until I need a hospital bed.

I used to be able to get a f2f appointment with the GP before I start work at 10:30am even if it meant waiting a drew weeks got the appointment, which was fine.

Now I have to book annual leave for every appointment, as with téléphone appointments they don't seem to be able to specify a time when the Dr will call, they just give you either a morning or afternoon time slot. I can't take calls whilst at work, and can't leave work at short notice to take a call.

I am pissed off, as this year I've already used up 3 precious days of my bare minimum annual leave just to be able to have a 5 minute conversation with a distracted and disinterested GP. I can't afford to take days of unpaid leave. I know how hard GPs work and that there are not enough of them etc etc, but this is entirely an issue if how the surgery chooses to operate. The new system might be better for some people, but for others it is blocking them from access to healthcare.

It's not GP basing to be annoyed at not being able to access healthcare.

copied from wikipedia so details might not be accurate and I think I'd seen some supportive content not set out in the following cut and paste.

in year six of her postgraduate training (ST6) who had recently returned from maternity leave, who was responsible for Jack's care. There was no senior consultant available, leaving her with sole responsibility for the whole CAU. Rota gaps had meant that Bawa-Garba had to cover the work of two other doctors[9] and the on-call consultant was off-site in Warwick until 4.30pm that day, as he had not realised he was on-call. The morning hand-over between the incoming and outgoing teams was not completed due to a cardiac arrest call.

Many looked askance at the immediate behaviour and future decisions of some of the other HCPs involved, the Trust and the court. From what I saw, I have no confidence in the jury's verdict nor in the Judge's actions. I'm sceptical whether the BMA would have treated a white male doctor the same way. She ultimately succeeded in her fitness to practice appeal with caveats.

This reminded many HCPs of where the bullets will be directed when they provide care in a system that is broken.

"I would not want that person treating my child under any circumstances." -
Personally, I don't think I'd have concerns about her treating my DC. I don't have a choice about the system that would care for a DC who needed care beyond what I or family could provide.

Someone could say she should not have worked in that system on that day/night but then she would have been hung out to dry. Then again, it looks like she was.

For me, it's not that I'd

His name was Jack Adcock

This is an in depth article about what happened that day and the preceding months.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/the_struck_off_doctor

I know his name. And his family members. And I read the judgements. And the Court of Appeal judgment. And other material.

BTW, without checking, could you say what happened to the Trust Chief Executive?

The Dr also appealed and was given her license back, albeit with certain recommendations in place and a drop of income.

What happened to the nurses who were also found guilty during the trial?

She was. My faith in the rigour of the system and the soundness of jury's verdicts is tempered by my observed experience of the English system - I sat through a trial of a friend (non medical related) which led to a conviction. During the entirety of the trial, no objective evidence beyond assertion was provided but the jury convicted and the judge sentenced. Their counsel was surprised having said there was no 'prospect of a conviction'. The pre-Appeal review said there was a strong prospect of overturning the verdict but distrust of a system that vappeared to me to have failed them, the risk of costs on top of six figure costs and absolute fear of an increased sentence led to that verdict standing so on paper they look as guilty as Dr Bawa Gerber and a ringing endorsement of the system and decisions by CPS, jury and Judge implied in your post. It fundamentally changed my view of the English courts.

Interesting that we all recognise the NHS hospital system can make mistakes (it certainly can) and be broken but trial verdicts can be taken at face value and the justice system not be broken in its own way. All those racist verdicts and 'fitting up' that got overturned years or decades later must not have happened. None of the barristers with whom I am acquainted seem to have the faith in the system your post implied.

When did I say was it was the norm? I set out my own experience which has led me not to automatically take a conviction at face value. I agree about the consultant but don't agree the main aberration was the consultant, rather the Trust responsible for the IT systems and staffing but I don't know enough about corporate manslaughter. Much like the Chinook situation and similar structural deficiencies, it might appear to be in a system's interest to hold an individual out to dry.

Having thought about it, I don't have concerns about her treating my DC. I'd need to check if I were in Leicester and could say the same now about that Trust.

@Burntoutbarbara sorry to hear that but not surprised.

I wonder if the PPs who think you earn a fortune for a PT job will be surprised at you handing back that golden goose of a contract? The next practice along will close this year and we can't recruit.

@burntoutbarbara you can't blame the patients for doctors surgeries closing. I don't doubt that you get some utter twats, but you will also unfortunately be bearing the brunt of people who are unhappy because they are having trouble accessing treatment, or are upset with poor treatment they are receiving.

I've seen this attitude from GPs before that most patients are timewaters, and I think it's one of the reasons some people lack sympathy for GPs on general. It's hard to empathise if all your own personal experiences are of dismissive or unhelpful doctors. I don't think I've had an interaction with a GP in the past 10 years where they haven't treated me like I'm a moron.

It's like a catch 22, doctors think patients are shit, patients think doctors are shit, and there the government sit doing fuck all and getting away with it.

You can add dentists to the list. Still not taking appointments.

I no longer give a toss what you all think
It is the most thankless job ever and all we ever get is complaints. No one even attempts to try and understand. We hear your frustrations and we understand how hard it has been and still is to be a patient. But it isn’t because we aren’t working hard enough and to hear that over and over whilst we work ourselves to the ground is pitiful.

Disheartening to hear an NHS GP talk like this. It's horrible that the profession is this burnt out. But it's hard to know that you (and your colleagues) are aware of how frustrated so many patients are and nothing is being done. Between PCNs and CCGs, especially now that CCGs are part of ICSs, you'd think someone somewhere would have the clout to point out the system isn't working and to make some meaningful change. It just makes me think the whole system is doomed.

(Crikey, doesn't the NHS love a TLA.)

Happy to be tone deaf and unattractive, indeed would rather be that than wrong about drawing attention to systemic failures that threw her under a bus and would have thrown many HCPs in the same position.

How many miscarriages of justice have there been found in the system in which you have confidence? How many are yet to be found (an unknowable number, I know)? BTW, how many involved Black people? and Irish?

I expect people said the same about the Postmasters and mistresses who got jailed. Some sorted in the end and I expect those jailed will get over it. Arguably an example of a system that found it easier to target an individual. Perhaps the one who got jailed when she was pregnant might regret the impacts on her pregnancy though I expect the system in which you seem to have real confidence included a Judge and the (in house) prosecutor bringing real rigour to the trial. I've little personal experience beyond what I see in the press and the one travesty I witnessed so I defer to you, @NotPersephone