NHS England and the General Practitioners Committee (GPC) of the BMA has published guidance to support GP practices to provide online access to patient records, subject to existing safeguards for vulnerable groups, third parties and technical considerations. For further information, please click on the link below:

A recent blog written for Pulse, by Guarav Gupta, GPC UK member and chair of Kent LMC, discusses how practices can fight unfunded transfer of work from hospitals to GP practices. He describes the progress made so far and points to useful resources of information to deal with hospitals that aren't complying. He also includes some BMA template letters which practices can use to write to CCGs and hospitals. To read the full article, please click here:

In June and July this year, over 3700 doctors completed a GMC survey on the satisfaction of their role, the environment they work in and their career intentions. Overall, the findings showed that GPs are more likely to feel dissatisfied, to have already reduced or plan to reduce their hours, and to be thinking about leaving the profession. The results showed that over the last year, 36% of GPs reduced their clinical hours, compared with 21% of all doctors having taken this action. Only 9% of GPs reported always or usually feeling able to cope, while rarely or never working beyond their rostered hours, compared to 26% of all doctors.

The chair of the GMC, Dame Clare Marx, speaking at RCGP Conference in Liverpool, reiterated the organisation's support for GPs to be recognised as specialists. She welcomed the initiative led by GPC UK and the RCGP and committed to work together to actively encourage the DHSC to bring all medics together on a single advanced practice register. She said: "There still is, within the medical community, some very old fashioned snobbery about GP training (and recognising GPs as specialists) would simplify the structure and make crystal clear the parity of expertise across UK general practice."