GP trainees concerned about unsustainable workloads

The Royal College of GPs has made a plea for the government to better support GP trainees after a survey by the King’s Fund found that they are being exposed to huge pressures.

Since 2016, The King’s Fund has surveyed GP trainees on their future career plans and 340 trainees responded to the survey this year.

One key theme was trainees’ concerns about an unsustainable workload after completing training. Many respondents said, even as trainees, they often had to work beyond contracted hours to keep on top of their workload.

The top three concerns were the intensity of the working day (82% of respondents), volume of administrative work (75%) and work-related stress (65%). Many respondents said they planned to reduce the number of clinical half-day sessions they work when they qualify.

RCGP College Chair Kamila Hawthorne said the survey shows that to trainees need to be nurtured and supported more as the profession and patients will be relying on them to keep general practice afloat in the years to come.

She added: “Sadly, these survey results show that even from the early stages of their training, too many GP trainees are now being exposed to the same huge pressures that their experienced colleagues are having to contend with, on a daily basis. Others can see for themselves what the GPs in their practices are having to cope with.

“We sincerely hope that the present and any future government will see these alarming figures from the Kings Fund survey as a wake-up call and take urgent action to stop the decline in general practice before it’s too late. It triangulates what we have been saying to Ministers for years now.”

Action is needed to improve retention of GP trainees

The survey saw a 10 percentage point increase from last year in the number of trainees planning to do no clinical work or still being unsure of their plans five years after qualifying. It said that these findings suggest that unless action is taken to improve retention of GPs the number of full-time equivalent GPs may continue to fall. Respondents identified the top three priorities to improve retention as better pay, improved workload and longer appointment slots.

When asked about their career plans one year after qualifying, the most common response (41%)  was an intention to work five to six clinical sessions (out of a possible 10) per week possibly because the workload means that in reality these part-time hours are often actually full time because of the significant number of additional unpaid hours of work required.

Respondents who planned to work outside NHS general practice most commonly planned to work in other NHS settings, such as hospitals, undertake out-of-hours work or private clinical work, move abroad or work in medical education. Of the 311 respondents who answered this question, a higher percentage compared to the 2022 survey plan to move abroad to work (43% of those intending to work outside NHS general practice in 2023 compared to 30% in 2022) or undertake private work (40% in 2023 compared to 33% in 2022).

“Being a GP can be the best job in medicine, you play a key role in your community and can really make a difference to the lives of your patients, providing the care that they need and deserve. But we need the resources and the funding to make this happen and they’re just not there at present,” Professor Hawthorne said.

“Despite this, I want to reassure our trainees – at whatever stage they are in their training – that things will get better and that your College will fight your corner until it does.”