One in five patients can't contact their GP

Hundreds of thousands of people cannot book GP appointments because none are available, or struggle to get through to their surgery on the phone, according to the latest GP Patient Survey.

One patient in five finds it difficult to contact their GP.

• 21% said it was not easy to get through on the phone to their GP surgery.
• 38% said it was fairly easy and
• 31% thought it was very easy.

The poll of 1.93 million people covered GP practices in England and was carried out between January and December 2010 for the Department of Health.

Of the 1.1 million people who had tried to see a doctor fairly quickly in the previous six months, 79% had been able to do so. But one in five (20%) could not, with 83% of those saying that the reason was that there were no appointments available. Another 15% said it was because the times offered did not suit them, while 5% said they could have seen a nurse but wanted to see a doctor.

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