The Health News United Kingdom May 10 2018

Doctor Laurence Buckman, formerly the highest-ranking GP at the British Medical Association (BMA) stated the unwillingness by new GPs to work as hard as their older colleagues is threatening to overwhelm surgeries and that the appetite among young family doctors to “go beyond the extra mile has evaporated” in recent years.

According to Doctor Laurence Buckman, formerly the highest-ranking general practitioner at the British Medical Association (BMA), the unwillingness by new GPs to work as hard as their older colleagues is threatening to overwhelm surgeries and that the appetite among young family doctors to “go beyond the extra mile has evaporated” in recent years. He stated: “My younger partners can do the extra hours if necessary but they really don’t like it – younger doctors really do not want to work a fourteen-hour day.”

The Government has committed to create up to five thousand extra GPs by two thousand twenty compared to two thousand fifteen in a bid to ease pressure, as well as increasing incentives for experienced family doctors to keep practising.

Doctor Buckman wrote in the British Medical Journal that there should be a daily cap on patient numbers in order to avoid tired doctors making mistakes. He also says that it is common for GPs to see around thirty six patients each day, not including walk-in “emergencies” and those seen in out-visits. Also due to the younger GPs unwillingness to work the same amount of hours of older doctor stems partly from a different approach to patient safety, but is also because so many view general practice as an escape from the notoriously long shifts required in hospitals.