Blairgowrie doctor warns excessive workload gives GPs second thoughts about staying on

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A Blairgowrie doctor and leader of Scotland’s GPs made a searing conference speech highlighting the need for action to stop “the slow death of general practice as we know it”.

He claimed doctors in the community were at a “tipping point.” BMA Scottish GPs committee chair Andrew Buist from Blairgowrie was speaking on December 2 at the Scottish Local Medical Committees Conference 2022.

He called on the Scottish Government to act quickly to prevent more practices collapsing and to make general practice an attractive career again.Dr Buist admitted that he himself could no longer immediately say yes to recommending general practice as a career.In a despairing speech to the conference of Scottish local medical committees in Clydebank, Dr Buist said a recent wellbeing survey of more than 1000 General Practice doctors in Scotland painted a grim picture.Three quarters said the past year made them more likely to take early retirement or leave the profession.The same proportion said excessive workload made them more likely to reduce hours, and just 18 per cent would recommend general practice as a career.The GP explained these were dangerous attitudes: “I have been a GP for 30 years – I am proud to call myself a GP, it is a job with huge potential for job satisfaction in helping patients in sickness and to live well – but we are at a tipping point for general practice.“In recent years the sheer volume of workload in excess of our capacity has made the job unbearable at times.“Being a GP has been, is, and can continue to be, a hugely rewarding career choice but we need a new vision for primary care with sufficient GPs with the time and the back-up of a full multidisciplinary team, to allow GPs to focus on being expert medical