BMA: Contract benefits patients
Thursday, 28 Feb 2008 18:12
The new GPs' contract is benefiting patients as it has enabled GPs to spend more time with them, the British Medical Association (BMA) has said.
Its comments follow a report from the National Audit Office (NAO) which claims the contract has cost £1.76 billion more than planned and has failed to increase productivity.
The NAO says productivity has dropped by an average of 2.5 per cent per year in the first two years of the contract and while the number of consultations with patients has increased, its report states these are not in proportion with the increase in costs.
In response, Dr Laurence Buckman, chairman of the BMA's GP committee, said: "It has to be remembered that the new contract was brought in to address the severe shortage of GPs, to reduce the excessive hours they were working and to redress the pay imbalance – before 2004 the UK's GPs were among the worst paid in the world.
"General practice has changed and primary care is now provided by a whole team working in the surgery."
He added: "The number of consultations has gone up, the time spent with the patient has increased and the work GPs do is more complex.
"In fact the entire way GPs work has changed so it's meaningless to talk about productivity in the way the NAO has done. GP productivity should be measured in improvements in health, not the frequency of consultations – and the early evidence is that the contract is leading to improvements in clinical care."
