Practices paid just £13 per month per patient

GP practices were paid just £152 per patient last year, or £13 a month, according to the latest official data.
 
NHS Digital yesterday published the annual report on payments to general practice 2017/18.
 
It says that nationally the NHS paid on average £152.04 per registered patient. This is just 0.4% higher than the 2016/17 figure of £151.37 per patient, although the overall GP contractual increase for the year was 3.3% including other funding streams.
 
BMA GP Committee chair Dr Richard Vautrey said: ‘Despite the pressures of increased demand, unmanageable workloads and rising costs, GPs and their practice teams across the country are going to great lengths to provide high quality, person centred care to patients in their area.
 
‘These figures show that practices received on average just £152 per patient in the last year to provide unlimited access to the wide range of expert services available at surgeries.
 
‘While this represents great value for the Government, less than £13 a month and just a 0.4% increase since last year is clearly not sustainable as demand increases.
 
‘The Prime Minister has committed to increase the overall share of the NHS budget going to primary care, and this data underlines how only an urgent and significant increase in investment will address the pressures affecting the profession and patients.’
 
Having been delayed for months, the Government’s long-term plan for the NHS was due to be published ‘before Christmas’.
 
However, it is understood to have been delayed by the Brexit turmoil and is now not expected until January. 
 
This story was first published by our sister publication Pulse.