I was intrigued by Dr Clare Gerada’s long read (‘In my 30 years as a GP, the profession has been horribly eroded’, 22 February). I left general practice in late 1990, a few months before Dr Gerada began her own distinguished career. The changes she so graphically describes were incipient even then. The personal, responsive and resilient service provided by a dedicated and stable workforce was already under threat.
The shift to an impersonal gig economy has been driven by inexorable consumer demand, untempered by any significant response from the profession.
It is my opinion that the General Medical Council and Royal College of General Practitioners could have done far more to retain the ethical, personal and accessible services threatened by the intrusive and bureaucratic contracts of 1990 and 2004. My profession’s weakness and possible complicity has led us to the situation we find ourselves in today.
Peter Baddeley
Painswick, Gloucestershire
• I write to applaud Dr Clare Gerada’s account of general practice. I too was a GP in south London, but from 1962 until 1996. In the early days, I had a highly visible yellow Renault 4 and would often come out from Safeways to a small queue of people by the car asking for a repeat prescription “to save an appointment, doctor”. These I would cheerfully give as I knew everyone and they had a point.
There was no appointment system at the surgery, but numbered cards on hooks in the hall meant you could nip out to do a bit of shopping while waiting.
The absence of technology meant the art of diagnosis – as it was called – was vital. We were taught in the Royal Free medical school to “listen to the patient – they are telling you the diagnosis”, and I hope I always used that wisely.
Dr Margaret Taylor
Clare, Suffolk
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