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Dr S D Reeves Dr S J Ockelford Dr R Kalia Dr C David Dr A Bajracharya

SOUTHWELL MEDICAL CENTRE

The Ropewalk. Southwell. Notts NG25 0AL

Southwell GPs are committed to provide high quality, patient centred care. We hope that we achieve this for all our patients.

The NHS is not perfect and can always improve. For every episode of poor care nationally, there are thousands of positive experiences.

The current life expectancy in England is 80.27 years. This is significantly higher than in the USA.

Over the last 10 years the average life expectancy in England has increased by 2 years. It has to be acknowledged that the excellent care provided by GPs and their practice teams has contributed significantly to this.

Good healthcare is a partnership between patients and the NHS and we rely on patients working with us to provide the best level of care possible.

General Practice – The Facts

General Practice is seen by many as “the jewel in the crown” of the NHS yet media coverage would suggest that much that goes wrong in the NHS is now the fault of GPs.

In 2013 a US healthcare think tank, “The Commonwealth Fund”, praised the NHS for offering the best primary care service in the world.

·  In 2012 the national GP survey reported that 85% of the population’s experience of general practice here at Southwell was good. A significant majority of patients were satisfied with practice opening times.

·  In 1995 there were 218,000,000 consultations in general practice. By 2009 this had risen to 300,000,000. Here at Southwell we hold over 66,500 consultations each year – 3% above the national average for a practice of this size.

·  The average patient nationally saw a clinician at their practice 3.9 times a year in 1995. By 2009 this had risen to 5.5 times.

·  Over 1 million people have an appointment in general practice every day. Here at Southwell we consult with 256 patients each working day.

·  In 1987 the average length of appointment in general practice was 6 minutes nationally. It is now 10-12 minutes.

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·  There are 10.5 million people in the UK who are aged 65 or above and this is expected to increase by 50% in the next 20 years. This will impact significantly on the NHS. In addition, 18 million people have a chronic

condition and this is expected to increase by 30% in the next 10 years. The majority of chronic conditions are managed in general practice. Over 35% of our patients have at least one chronic condition.

·  General Practice receives less than 9% of the NHS budget.

·  The media suggests that practices are only open from 9am – 5pm on week days. We open at 8am and do not close until 6.00pm.

·  Media reports also suggest that GPs do not work “out of hours”. This is not true. In this area there is a provider of out of hours services which employs GPs to provide this service – much like the old GP cooperatives that were in place in the past. In addition, our GPs do their professional development and learning when the practice is closed, keeping them up-to-date with the latest medical developments to ensure the quality of your care.

·  In the past GPs worked in the practice during the day and also covered patients over night. This was changed as it was not seen as safe for a doctor to be up for much of the night and then work the next day and be expected to make safe decisions about patient’s healthcare.

·  An average GP in the UK works 50-60 hours per week.

We are not perfect, as a profession or as a practice, and we are always seeking to improve our services to better meet the needs of our patients. We would encourage patients to work with us by using our suggestions scheme and our Patient Participation Group (Southwell Medical User Group).