GP appointment waiting times ‘to rocket towards three weeks’

Credit: This story was first seen on The Telegraph

Waiting times for a GP appointment are set to surge towards three weeks because of a shortage of family doctors, a new survey warns.

The Telegraph reports patients are currently waiting an average of around 13 days to see their doctor, with the time having jumped by three days since 2015 alone.

Those delays are now predicted to ‘rocket’ further over the next Parliament, as GPs are forced to spend an extra four hours each week seeing patients to keep up with demand according to Pulse magazine.

The findings come amid warnings that growing waits for appointments are fuelling the A&E crisis.

Without urgent action, waits will quickly soar to ‘several weeks’ the British Medical Association (BMA) warned.

A Tory pledge to add another 5,000 extra GPs by the end of the decade will be unable to keep up with the rise and the profession is already suffering a recruitment crisis.