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GP Retention and Recruitment: What are we going to do about the GP crisis?

As you will know, most health systems are struggling to recruit and retain GPs.

Adrienne Taylor
Adrienne Taylor

A recent BMJ Open, publication revealed that in one region, 42.1% of GPs intend to leave or retire from NHS general practice within the next five years compared to 31.8% of those surveyed in the same region in 2014, an increase of almost a third.

With over one in 10 (16%) of respondents to a recent (2023) BMA survey advising that they plan to leave the NHS altogether after the COVID-19 pandemic, losses are set to continue further if the Government does not take appropriate action.

NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin (STW) Integrated Care Board (ICB) understood that it is therefore very important to attempt to better understand the prospects and the reasons for them, locally.

STW commissioned Primary Care Commissioning (PCC), to help gain this crucial insight.

What we did:

Spoke to key stakeholders to ensure a good understanding of local issues; we did not assume that they were exactly the same as national issues.

Working with the ICB, devised four separate, but related surveys to ask respondents about their experiences in relation to GP retention:

  • Fully qualified GPs
  • Graduate Doctors in Training
  • Foundation Year Doctors
  • Medical Students

With a further survey targeted at recruiters of GPs, i.e. mainly the GP practices.

The ICB circulated the surveys via key stakeholders and other internal communication methods, appropriate for each target group. All GPs working in the ICB area were invited to respond, whether working permanently, or on ad hoc basis in the area.

The response rate was respectable, with an estimated 33% of responses from GPs (difficult to exactly assess due to being unable to be sure of locum numbers), and over 50% of responses from graduate doctors (50 out of approximately 90).

The findings were shared for the purpose of gaining a “sense check” on what the results said and proposed ways forward.

Findings:

As expected, many of the findings follow a national trend, and are outside of the gift of STW ICB.

However, a number of findings pointed to local challenges that could be further investigated or local solutions devised, with the ICB working in partnership with GP practices.

Findings outside of ICB control will be considered for future lobbying, using the evidence base that the research has identified.

The work was funded utilising the GP Retention Funds allocation.. PCC would be happy to work with other ICBs in order to build this evidence base and identify/develop local solutions that could have a positive impact via local interventions.

Phil Morgan, the Primary Care Workforce Lead for STW ICB said “We’ve been really pleased with the work carried out by PCC to help us better understand the key issues and challenges facing our GPs. The consultant who designed and delivered the surveys, and then analysed and reported on the results, had an excellent understanding of the current issues facing General Practice and engaged professionally and effectively with a wide range of stakeholders across our ICB. We’re confident that PCC’s involvement will help us in our overall objectives in recruiting and retaining more GPs in our practices. We would have no hesitation in strongly recommending PCC to carry out similar work in other ICBs”.

Last Updated on 28 July 2023