Patients urge GPs to open all hours

Published on Thursday 31 December 2009 21:41

MORE doctors should offer appointments outside normal hours to improve access for working patients, campaigners demanded yesterday.

Figures show that only 67 per cent of GP practices in Scotland had agreed to offer extended opening, up from around 60 per cent in March.

The Scotland Patients Association said that more should join the scheme, offering appointments in the evenings and weekends, to help people who had to work.

The British Medical Association (BMA) said they had never opposed extended hours, but did not believe it was the best use of resources.

They said many doctors opening outside normal hours were left facing empty surgeries or seeing patients who could easily come during the day.

Figures from the Scottish Government show that 309 practices out of 1,017 have said they will not participate in extended hours.

But 674 practices have contractually signed up to the scheme, with a further eight saying they will participate and 26 undecided.

In return for extra funding, since the start of 2008 GPs have been asked to offer an extra 30 minutes of appointments a week for every 1,000 patients.

An average practice could receive around 19,000 for providing this service, but many have said it costs more to offer extended hours and ensure staff security during these times.

Margaret Watt, chair of the Scotland Patients Association, said more doctors should be offering extended hours.

"There are people who are working and employers are not as willing nowadays about letting people out for appointments as they used to be.

"Doctors do a brilliant job and we are behind our GPs completely.

"But we would like to think about not only extending GP hours but for that to happen in the hospitals as well, so that scanners could be used in the evening."

Dr Dean Marshall, chairman of the BMA's Scottish GPs committee, said: "Our position right from the beginning has been that we are not opposed to extended hours.

"But what we are saying is the one-size-fits-all approach doesn't work for Scotland and doesn't make sense because of the demographics of Scotland.

"Our experience so far is that the vast majority of people who use these appointments could have come during the day.

"This just allows the politicians to announce something that actually doesn't add anything to the service to patients because we're not allowed to keep the appointments for people who work."

Dr Marshall said doctors in remote areas were sitting in their surgeries during the extended hours periods and seeing no patients.

He said that those practices who had not signed up had decided that the way it was funded did not cover the expense of providing the service.

Health secretary Nicola Sturgeon said: "It's extremely welcome that more than two-thirds of Scottish surgeries are now offering extended opening hours and this is benefiting thousands of patients nationwide every week.

"While this has already exceeded our expectations, I would call on NHS boards to encourage even more to extend their hours."