Dr Mary McCarthy: GPs battling to hold back surge at surgeries
On some days, morning surgery seems to stretch on for ever.
More often than not, appointments are completely booked up and GPs become frustrated that there just aren't the necessary resources or time to give patients the care they need and deserve.
The reality is that general practice is experiencing an unprecedented workload, due to the combination of an increase in demand, primarily from an ageing population, and diminishing resources.
One in three people in the UK are currently aged over 50, and one in six are 65 and over.
Our high-level of healthcare means that many of the diseases that would have killed people in the past have been cured or are manageable. While this means people are living for longer, it also means that they are, probably, living with long-term complex conditions such as diabetes or heart and kidney disease, and require ongoing treatment and specialist care.
The situation for one of my patients this week, really brought home the reality of the complex medical care that's now required.
We see her regularly because of ongoing asthma treatment. Early in life, she worked in dusty conditions which have damaged her lungs and her asthma progressed to chronic airway disease meaning not just regular use of three inhalers but constant vigilance against recurrent chest infections.
Her lungs don't give her the oxygen she needs, so exercise has become more difficult and she has put on weight. She has a family history of diabetes and as she has become older and has put on weight, she has also become diabetic.
Routine blood tests that monitor her diabetic control have now shown that her thyroid is not working as well as it should and she needs replacement thyroxine to correct things. The thyroid controls how fast or slow the body works, a bit like the accelerator on a car – too much and your heart races, you feel jittery and lose weight; too little and you gain weight, feel slow and are tired all the time.
So now this lady is coping with obesity, diabetes, thyroid disease and lungs that don't work as well as they should. Not only is she taking medications for these but also drugs to control her blood pressure and protect her kidneys. No wonder she is confused about what to take when.
