Health & Family

Don’t blame it on the GP

MOSTpeople like and value the service their GP practice offers. They just want more of it. In the last national patient survey, 83% of us rated it as “very good” when we actually got to be seen. The problem is that it’s getting harder to be seen in a service short of 6,000 GPs coping with a backlog of unmet need built up over 18 months in a By DrPHIL HAMMOND pandemic. GP shortages are nothing new. Back in 2016, the Daily Mail lead with a headline “a month to see a GP”. The government then promised 6,000 extra full time GPs and has manifestly failed to deliver.

Whilst the total GP headcount has gone up a little, the number of “full time equivalent” GPs has fallen by 6.4% since the promise was made. The good news is that the number of GPs in training has risen by 36% (from 5026 to 6855).

The challenge then becomes retaining doctors in a service when they are over-worked and blamed by the media and government to cover up for its own failings.

The Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, Prime Minister and Health Secretary are all demanding more face-to-face GP appointments, irrespective of clinical need, just a few months after former health secretary Matt Hancock declared that the NHS should have “a digital front door” with 85% of contacts dealt via email, video consultation or over the phone.

Telegraph columnist, Allison Pearson, described GP services as "cruel, negligent and, frankly, inhuman treatment". In fact, many patients prefer a phone call or video consultation to visiting the surgery.

Just remember we wouldn’t be in the position to slag off general practice if general practice hadn’t delivered 70% of the Covid vaccines. We’d still be counting the bodies. As it is, we still have the highest Covid infection and death rates amongst rich European nations because we are allowing the delta variant to run free and infect all those unvaccinated or for whom the vaccination hasn’t worked.

If we all pile back down the GP surgery over winter, we can expect all sorts of respiratory viruses to be exchanged in the over-crowded waiting rooms.

There is no simple answer in the short-term to health services not being able to cope with demand. We are all responsible for the funding and staffing of the NHS – we pay the taxes and choose the politicians to distribute them – and we have far fewer health and social care staff than most other rich countries.

For example, we have 2.8 doctors per 1000 people compared to the EU average of 3.7. Eleven-hour ambulance waits outside emergency departments and long queues inside is the winter norm in the UK.

Many more people die prematurely in the UK because they can’t or don’t get quick access to the highest quality healthcare for cancer, heart disease and stroke than will ever die from Covid. And yet we accept it. The rich can buy their way out of trouble and generally live ten years longer than the poor, with 20 more years of disease-free living.

A decade of austerity will take a decade to reverse. Life expectancy increases have stalled in women and are falling in men. There is no magic doctor tree. So don’t take it out on the staff.

There has been a sharp uptake of aggression, and occasionally physical abuse, towards health and care staff as frustration boils over. General practice as we know it could collapse if we don’t cherish it.

Staff at all levels, from receptionists to senior partners, are walking away from the job, fed up with the flak and the inability to provide safe care. Whatever solutions the government comes up with, they must be built on compassion and understanding, not blame and aggression.

Dr Phil is author of the best-seller “Dr Hammond’s Covid Casebook” and “Staying Alive. How to Improve your health and your healthcare”

Plop the Raindrop

THISis one of my favourite times of the year, when we get the chance to dress up depending on what the weather is doing.

I’m not talking here about wellie boots, coats and hats. I’m talking about a total transition.

In the autumn we water droplets can look like ghosts and go swirling all over the place. Dressed as mist we go curling around the bottom of the valleys or sit like a hat on the top of the hills. We often like to float across the Somerset Levels and lakes like Chew Valley.

Mist is a good place to play hide and seek, scattering wet autumn leaves as you go. Watch out for birds doing the same thing to find food. Or a mammoth hiding up a tree. I swear I saw one once, though it might have been a giraffe. On many occasions I’ve landed on someone’s coat as they brushed by and got a lift back to their home. Warm and snug, with the coat drying by the fire, I usually doze off and then find myself shooting up the chimney in an invisible puff of steam.

That’s how we can end up in clouds and when they get angry I change again into a fat rain drop, which might come and whack your window. Sometimes those clouds clang together in a storm, like the world’s noisiest drums. Then we’ll run off down the road like a giant snake slithering down a drain.

It’s only when it turns colder that we can start to wear our brightest clothes. I know some of you like a lot of glitter. Bet you can’t match me on a crisp frosty morning! We glint like diamonds in spiders’ webs and tree branches in delicate sparkling jewels.

Our ultimate transition, though, is when we coat the hills in snow. Millions of sparkling crystals, shining in the sunshine, like a magic cloak - until you lot trample all over us, make snowmen, or crush us into snowballs.

I could write about the transitory nature of transition, but I don’t want to bore you. Enjoy the weather, whatever it does!

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Strike up the band

WELLS City Band performed a special outdoor concert for residents and guests at the Crandon Springs retirement complex in the city as part of its Macmillan Cancer Support fundraising coffee morning.

The event was just one of the latest to be organised for residents by the team at Crandon Springs.

Each week they head out in their minibus to enjoy a local outing, typically supporting a local business. A recent trip saw them pumpkin picking at Farrington’s Farm Shop and

Philip Welch, the mayor of Wells, was amongst the guests. Wells Macmillan Cancer Support group is his mayoral charity Conductor and trumpet player Paul Denegri (right) with fellow band members, Bethany Chattwood, from Crandon Springs, and residents Amy Edwards and Pat Edwards

they are currently running a pumpkin carving competition. People under 16 are being asked to submit photos of their creations to be judged by the residents on Sunday, October 31st as part of their Halloween activities.

They also support local charities including the dementia care and mental wellbeing organisation Heads Up.

Crandon Springs opened in April this year and is designed so that each person it cares for feels completely supported in every aspect of their lives.

It is set within beautiful south facing landscaped gardens. It is also ideally situated within a short walking distance of the city centre.

Frome Walking Festival returns

FROME’S annual Walking Festival returns in November after group activities were cancelled due to the pandemic.

The town’s Walkers Are Welcome team and Frome Town Council have worked together to create a diverse programme of walks, covering subjects ranging from the town’s trees and pubs to history in conflict and in peace and much more.

The festival takes place from Friday, November 12th to Sunday, November 14th and offers guided and self-guided walks, trails and activities for all ages.

Town councillor Rich Ackroyd said: “It was bitterly disappointing to move the festival online last year, but that just makes the 2021 Walking Festival even more exciting.

“After a long time where walking was a solo activity, it’s more important than ever to show the value in sharing an outdoor experience, learning along the way. The programme this year is once-again packed with high quality walks.”

Most guided walks cost £6 but there are several events for those who’d prefer to head out in their own time, including selfguided walks and family friendly trails.

Walking leader and local historian David Lassman (right) prepares to lead one of the 2019 walks

For details, visit: www.discoverfrome.co.uk/frome-walking-festival/

Village artists return in real time

MEMBERS of the Leigh-on-Mendip village art and craft group were able to stage their first actual show together after the pandemic last year forced them to go online.

A two-day gallery in the village’s Memorial Hall showcased work ranging from wooden items to embroidery, paintings, photography and quilt making.

Back together – some of the artists who took part (l:r) Julian Back, Barry Nicholls, Vicki Taylor, Roger Orpwood and Nancy Freeman

Help wanted for Bernese Mountain Dog who can’t climb

REGULARSare rallying round to help Rico, a Bernese Mountain Dog, who has become trapped downstairs at the Wellington Arms pub in Rooksbridge after breaking both cruciate ligaments in his back legs.

For the last three months landlords Steve and Jen Grubb have had to move downstairs into a restaurant room to look after Rico, who has already had two operations on one leg.

Steve said: “Unfortunately we cannot continue to live downstairs forever as we need the room for customers. Rico is too big to help up and down our steep stairs and will not be able to return to our living quarters upstairs.”

Regulars have come up with the idea of getting a lift put in for Rico. After a favourable structural survey, Liftech Solutions of Bridgwater have offered to fit a suitable lift at a reduced price of £10,000.

Children of regulars are planning to raise the money by holding a skittles marathon on Halloween weekend October 30th and 31st. They aim to knock down 10,000 skittle pins over the weekend and are asking people to sponsor them at £1 a pin.

Jasmine and Dennis, both 14, who are stickers up for skittles teams at the pub, are preparing for a very hard weekend.

They said: “If we can raise the money to give Rico a lift it’ll be brilliant and worth the effort. We just hope people will support us.”

Everyone who donates will be entered into a draw for a £30 voucher to spend at the pub.