The GP slots hardly any patients want: Doctors brand flagship seven day scheme a ‘shocking’ waste of NHS cash as patients don’t book weekend appointments
- Average of 25 per cent of evening and weekend slots unfilled for past 18 months
- Doctors say patients do not want to spend time at weekends seeing a GP
- Estimated cost of unfilled appointments is at least £15million, according to Pulse
Patients are failing to book weekend GP appointments that are being rolled out in a flagship NHS scheme, figures reveal.
In one area, just 3 per cent of Sunday consultations have been filled on average in 18 months.
Other regions reported a quarter of these slots being taken, although Saturdays were more popular.
Doctors say patients do not want to spend time at weekends seeing a GP and would rather wait until Monday unless it is an emergency.
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Former prime minister David Cameron launched the ‘seven-day GP access scheme’ in 2014 to try to help A&E units and it has been gradually expanded
An average of 25 per cent of evening and weekend slots were unfilled over the past 18 months at a cost of at least £15million, according to figures obtained by Pulse, the magazine for GPs.
From today, health trusts across England will have to offer GP appointments seven days a week as part of a pledge by David Cameron.
The then-prime minister launched the ‘seven-day GP access scheme’ in 2014 to try to help A&E units and it has been gradually expanded.
But each appointment slot costs the NHS £30 to £50 regardless of whether patients show up or not and doctors have branded the scheme a ‘shocking’ waste of cash.
The figures show that at least 501,396 weekend and evening appointments were unfilled in the past 18 months. The scheme as a whole has already cost the NHS £1billion and this is expected to reach £1.5billion by the end of 2021.
Doctors’ leaders say GPs are being taken away from weekday appointments when demand is higher.
The number of unfilled slots has been described as ‘highly embarrassing’ by Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth who added that ‘scarce resources are being misdirected’
At weekends, patients also usually have to travel to another surgery and end up seeing an unfamiliar doctor. Surgeries form groups with up to 30 other practices and only one or two will offer the out-of-hours appointments.
Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: ‘This is highly embarrassing for ministers.’ He added that ‘scarce resources are being misdirected’.
Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, chairman of the Royal College of GPs, said it was ‘shocking’ so many slots were unfilled when surgeries were under extreme pressure.
Dr Richard Vautrey, chairman of the British Medical Association’s GP committee, said: ‘Because it has become a political must-do, everybody is jumping.’
Pulse used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain the figures from 80 Clinical Commissioning Groups, nearly half the total, for April 2017 to September 2018.
The Department of Health and Social Care said millions were benefiting from the scheme which is being backed by an extra £2.4billion a year for general practice by 2021.
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