KAMP were recently lucky enough to receive a visit from Meet David Kinnaird, the Parliamentary Candidate for East Wiltshire which encompasses the KAMP catchment area. David met with our GP Partners Dr Richard Hook and Dr Laura Freeman as well as the Practice Manager, Amy Lacey. We were able to discuss with him how the Practice is set up to deliver primary healthcare and the issues faced by general practice.
We were able to explain the difficulties providing sufficient GP Appointments and how we are expanding the range of services we provide so that patients don’t always need to see their GP. We described the funding problems we face as funding for the next financial year has been (just) announced with an increase of just 1.9%. Given the inflation of the past year, and the recent increase of 10% in minimum wage this meagre uplift has not gone down well.
David concluded that “if we want shorter waiting times, we must fund primary care properly and enable Partnerships to plan with confidence. We also need to train enough GPs and related clinicians. As a society we all need help ourselves with prevention and healthier lifestyles, be prepared to embrace telephone appointments and seeing other professionals other than the GP.”
David’s full and insightful article can be found on the following websites: