general practice

EXCLUSIVE LMC leaders in England are looking at potentially taking GPs out of the NHS, which could even involve charging patients directly for some GP services, Pulse has learned. Pulse has learnt that English LMCs are considering breaking off from the GPC due to disillusionment with the...

At least £1.5bn will be ploughed into extending GP access by 2021, but the Conservatives will still not be able to deliver what they promised in their manifesto, a Pulse analysis reveals. The analysis shows that £283m has already been allocated to pilots that are running in various areas across...

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt has admitted failing to prioritise building the GP workforce during his time as health secretary in a speech pledging to remove barriers to moving more NHS work into primary care. The health secretary told the Best Practice conference in Birmingham on Thursday that...

Some struggling GP surgeries in England will be allowed to fail and close, according to a leaked document. A letter from an NHS England official to managers and GPs in one region suggests vulnerable practices could be left to "wither by the system". The note, seen by the BBC and Pulse...

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt’s pledge to boost GP numbers by 5,000 by 2020 will deliver fewer than half the number needed to fill the UK’s growing workforce deficit, new modelling by primary care researchers suggests. The most ‘optimistic’ scenario produced by the team at Imperial College found...

Across England as a whole there are 1,364 patients per GP, according to experimental statistics published on Tuesday by NHS DIgital. But variation between regions is marked. In North Central and East London (NCEL) - which has the most GPs per patient - each primary care doctor looks after 1,122...

Only 100 extra GPs were added to the workforce in the last six months of 2015/16 in England, official figures have revealed, striking a blow to the Government’s aim of adding 5,000 extra GPs by 2020. The new figures from NHS Digital reveal that the number of GPs excluding registrars, retainers...

NHS chiefs in England have announced a five-year plan to help GP surgeries "get back on their feet" and to improve access for patients. The rescue package will see an extra £2.4bn a year ploughed into services by 2020 - a rise of 14% once inflation is taken into account. It will pay for 5,000...

Ministers look likely to spectacularly fail to meet targets on GP recruitment. An analysis claims they are expected to hire just 2,100 additional family doctors by 2020 – not even half the number they promised. And that is a best case scenario. The Government has repeatedly pledged to install...

More than 800 GP practices in England are at risk of having to close due to being ’financially unsustainable’, a major BMA survey has shown. The survey of 2,830 practices found that 294 practices (10%) regard themselves as financially unsustainable within the next year. It also shows that...

Patients who do not visit their GP for five years could be barred from their doctor’s surgery under plans being developed in the east of England. Under the move, patients who have not seen their GP for five years will be sent two letters asking them to respond. If they do not get in touch to...

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt will fail to deliver this year on his promise to increase the proportion of funding going into general practice, despite the 3.2% funding uplift for practices, a Pulse analysis has revealed. NHS England budget allocations has revealed that from April, general...

General practice is key to the survival of the NHS. If it fails, so will the whole health service, argue Professor Martin Roland and Sir Sam Everington in an editorial* published in The BMJ today. But focusing on hospital financial deficits is diverting attention away from the crisis in general...