A shift in the primary care landscape
Over the past couple of years, there has been significant activity in the Primary Care sector here in the Midlands.
Reporting of this activity by the mainstream media has been mainly negative in focus, but Primary Care specialist Martin Ramsey, of MHA MacIntyre Hudson, has a different story to tell. His work with groups of GPs from across both the Midlands and the wider country, shows that the changes taking place, can have real benefit for communities.
It’s well known that the Primary Care sector is under-funded, particularly when compared to acute trusts. Doctors are working longer hours, to meet both the clinical needs of their patients, as well as the increased administrative burden that is part of the modern healthcare environment.
As political pressure on increasing Primary Care through extended opening hours nationwide grows, GPs have come to understand that there is no change of direction on the horizon.
Recognising this, groups of GPs have concluded that by working together they can create business structures that improve their ability to respond to change. In practice this means being innovative, flexible and often stepping into the scary world of mergers and larger groupings of practices.
Martin says: “There is a perception from the public and indeed from many GPs that working ‘at scale’ means moving to a very corporate environment and giving up many of the benefits of working in a locally based partnership.
“Our experience tells us that this is not necessarily the case, and there are some excellent examples of practices working together, taking the best aspects of their existing businesses and combining them with the benefits of larger groupings of practices.
“This has resulted not only in improvements to the reported levels of patient care and satisfaction, but also to the work/life balance of GPs.”
As well as funding pressures the sector also faces difficulty in recruiting the next generation of GPs. Younger healthcare professionals often regard the sector as an unattractive option, seeing the negative news stories about long working hours and pressure.
Grouping together and working at scale can have a positive impact on GP recruitment and retention. With more efficient use of administrative and support staff, who can be relied upon to undertake the day to day running of the business, as well as the ability to use non-GP clinical staff such as nurses and pharmacists to reduce the burden on the doctors themselves, and as allowing GPs to specialise in areas of particular interest to them, a career as a GP can be made more attractive.
So, while the mainstream media would have you believe that GP practice mergers are always the negative consequence of a stressed environment.
The experience of me and my colleagues here at MHA MacIntyre Hudson have been very different. There can be very positive outcomes for patients, the public in general, as well as GPs – not to mention a better use of public funds!
