Increasing demands on general practice over the past five years – not just a heavier workload but the increasing complexity and intensity of work – have led to a feeling of crisis. The NHS is finding it difficult to recruit and retain sufficient GPs who want to do full-time, patient-facing work.
Moving care closer to home means that many activities previously undertaken in secondary care are now done in primary care, but funding has not followed the patients. At the same time, more people report difficulty in accessing care and are less satisfied with their experience of using GP services.
This report looks at patient factors, system factors and supply-side issues to see what lies behind this increasing pressure on general practice. It finds that despite GPs being at the heart of the health care system, a lack of nationally available, real-time data has made their changing workload largely invisible to commissioners and policy-makers.
Full report at The Kings Fund 5 May 2016