Doctors and its staff working in GP surgeries all over England they are denouncing a torrent of abuse of patients some received hate mail, while others were left shaking and crying from physical and verbal attacks.
Some family doctors have told you The independent they fear coming to work and have seen staff resign due to threats they receive almost daily.
Some surgeries have been the subject of bomb threats, while others have been painted with graffiti. Staff at a London practice have received hate mail threatening workers for their role in the COVID-19 deployment of vaccination. Others were sent abusive text messages describing staff as "Nazi bastards."
Gps They say most of the problems are due to the system being overwhelmed by demand and a false perception among some patients that GPs are closed and seeing fewer patients in the wake of the Covid crisis.
Delays in getting appointments due to a workforce crisis in the number of GPs and sudden increases in patients wanting to see doctors mean that some patients have to wait weeks for appointments that are not urgent.
But for GPs, they are faced with a relentless workload with many on duty for long hours with increasingly complex cases and more management as increasing numbers of patients await hospital treatment due to increasing delays in delivery. NHS turn to their GPs for support.
A recent survey by the British Medical Association found that half of physicians and two-thirds of GPs had seen their colleagues suffer violence or abuse.
A GP in London has reported hate speech messages it received from police after staff received multiple photocopies of a notice threatening their doctors and nurses that they would be "tried for war crimes and held accountable ".
The practice said: “This was photocopied multiple times and put into envelopes and individually addressed to each of our doctors and posted at the door after dark.
"We have received a number of abusive responses via text message, email, phone and in person as we try to keep all patients up to date."
The independent has spoken to GPs working in surgeries across England who fear that the rising levels of anger they are seeing in the public will prompt more doctors to quit their jobs and exacerbate the crisis already facing primary care.
Emily Ball, a GP working in Liverpool and a member of the EveryDoctor group, said she had been left shaking and crying after a tirade of abuse from a patient angry about delays in her hospital appointment.
In another incident earlier in the year, police had to be called when a man demanding antibiotics physically made his way into the office and followed staff while verbally abusing them. The man was not even a patient in the office.
Dr. Ball said: “We had to call the police. It was scary and unsurprisingly that staff member is gone now.
“It is the most insidious daily verbal abuse that is a real problem and has made staff sick. It is not a day that ends in 'y' unless a patient makes someone cry. It's very difficult to retain staff. "
He is supposed to work 31 hours a week, but has calculated that he currently works an average of 65 hours a week.
“We are on our knees. However, there is a perception that we have stopped seeing patients face to face and have not. We have seen people who have needed to be seen, all the time. "
Describing her own experience of abuse by an angry patient, she said: “He told me that I was 'fucking useless' that I shouldn't be practicing and that it was a shame that we didn't care about our patients. Several times he said he thought I should inform the GMC.
"I was physically shaking afterward."
Dr Ball, a 14-year-old GP, warned that the long-term impact would worsen the existing crisis for GPs, as their numbers have not been able to keep up with increasing population and demand.
“When you have an already demoralized workforce, and then they start getting kicked out by the same people who are literally committing suicide trying to help. What happens is that people start to burn out, they start to get sick and that means there is more pressure on the doctors left to burn out, get sick and before you know it you will not have a workforce. . "
A survey of more than 330 GPs in London in June found that more than half said the current demand for them was unmanageable and 82 percent warned that it was affecting the well-being of staff. Four-fifths of clinics said patient satisfaction was suffering.
Almost half of the practices had openings for GPs and some practices were forced to consider closing their doors, a move that would affect 22,500 patients.
Birmingham GP Lizzie Croton, a member of the Physicians Association, said that there are now more ways for patients to communicate with GPs via digital services, emails, etc. which, according to her, means more "cognitive load" for clinicians.
“We are experiencing increasing demand from patients. All the people I see, they think they need to see us and they are in some kind of distress.
“Our doors are wide open electronically and also physically, but each contract creates a workload. I work a couple of overtime hours every day and rarely have a lunch break.
“There has always been a wait on the NHS, but what is different at the moment is that people are not given dates or, if so, there are months to go. We have had verbal abuse, especially from the reception and administration staff, mainly due to waiting. Most of the time it is very understandable and you share the frustration of the patients, but we have had a few cases where it has been personal.
"People are less tolerant of having to wait to talk to someone."
In addition to frustration over waiting times and the demand for faster appointments, GPs have also been on the front line of a backlash against the Covid crisis and vaccination schemes.
A GP in London described how a patient who had been sent a vaccination reminder letter "broke into" an administrative office and began yelling at staff.
They said: “The man was aggressive enough that we called 999, yelling, cursing, getting too close and 'squaring up'. He filmed part of the incident, despite our requests that he not, and the video later made it to Twitter.
“This is the worst of several incidents. We have had reception staff crying several times in recent weeks because the patients or family members have been so unpleasant. "
The NHS has told many GPs to send text messages and reminders to residents to encourage them to get vaccinated.
The independent Multiple examples of aggressive and rude messages sent to surgeries in response have been shown, including one that described staff as "Nazi bastards."
Dr Michelle Drage, Executive Director of the London Local Medical Committee, said: “NHS England And the government must spread the message nationally that the general practice is working as hard as possible, and those on the other side of the reception desk, the consulting room, or at the end of the phone are people, not anonymous people. soundboard for frustrations.
“London practice staff are receiving profanity-filled text messages in response to vaccination reminders and those who make calls are receiving abuse and threats of being reported to regulators, all just for doing what the NHS instructs. Even those people who simply doubt vaccines they are known to become abusive after repeated contact. "
The Royal College of GPs said there was a serious misconception about the work of GPs who continued to see patients when needed. He said the practices were busier than ever and at the same time administering two-thirds of all Covid vaccines.
Professor Martin Marshall, President of the RCGP, said: “It is totally unacceptable that anyone working in general practice is the recipient of abuse of any kind, let alone the threat of physical violence.
“General practice has been open throughout the pandemic and face-to-face appointments have been offered whenever safe and appropriate.
“The real problem is that we have a severe shortage of GPs and our workforce is not large enough to handle the needs of an aging and growing patient population with increasingly complex needs. This was the case before the pandemic and has only been exacerbated by the events of the past year. "
He said it was vital that the government deliver on its promise of 6,000 additional GPs by 2024.
