Catalogue description General Medical Practitioners Workload Survey: 1992-1993 Survey

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Details of JA 9/1
Reference: JA 9/1
Title: General Medical Practitioners Workload Survey: 1992-1993 Survey
Description: This dataset contains data collected during the General Medical Practitioners Workload Survey 1992-1993.

The dataset comprises four tables. Two contain only data gathered in the early months of the survey and form the interim results of the survey. The remaining two tables contain the final results of the survey.

Each Doctor completing the survey was asked to complete a diary sheet for their survey week logging their activities at half-hourly intervals from 7.00AM on the Monday morning to 06.59AM the following Monday. The Diary sheets recorded the time spent taking surgery and the number of face-to-face and telephone consultations made during surgery time. It recorded the number of home visits made and the time taken on home visits, including travelling. GPs were also asked to record the amount of time spent attending clinics outside their normal surgery activities and the number of patients seen at such clinics. The diary sheets also recorded the number of patients referred to a hospital and the time spent on patient casework, including arranging hospital admissions, paperwork and formal and informal discussions with medical colleagues, practice staff and representatives of external agencies, for example social services, regarding individual patients' cases. Doctors were also asked to record the time they spent on activities related to the administration of their practice, attendance at conferences and training courses, professional reading, time taken with pharmaceutical and medical representatives, either in person or on the telephone. A wide variety of other professional activities not covered elsewhere on the diary sheets were also logged and could include minor surgery, completing insurance or other forms, work as a social security medical officer or a police surgeon and any time spent working for commercial locum services. The amount of time not spent on professional activities such as recreational activities, illness, holiday or sleeping was also recorded. For all of the survey period GPs were asked to indicate what on call arrangements were in place eg whether they were personally on call, part of an on call rota with other colleagues from their practice or using a commercial locum service.

The second part of the survey recorded general details about the participating GP's practice and its staff. They were asked to complete the survey form at the end of their survey week. This part of the survey recorded whether the GP participating in the survey worked alone or as part of a partnership, the number of hours contracted to their local Family Health Service Authority (FHSA), the size of their patient list and any participation in child health surveillance. The survey included questions about GP training, fundholding, use of computers in the practice and any activities outside of a normal GP surgery, eg police surgeon work. Questions were also asked about whether the respondents felt that their survey week represented a typical working week. The number of staff employed by and attached to the practice were recorded. Employed staff could include nurses, practice managers, reception or administrative staff. Attached staff could include Health Visitors, District Nurses or Midwives. Finally respondents were asked to look at a table of typical activities for a family doctor and to rate them according to the degree of pressure they caused during the survey week. The final survey report stated that balancing the demands of work and family/social life, night visits, being on call and emergency phone calls from patients late at night, early in the morning and during surgery hours were the highest causes of pressure.
Date: 1992-1993
Held by: The National Archives, Kew
Former reference in The National Archives: CRDA/63/DS/1
Legal status: Public Record(s)
Closure status: Open Document, Open Description
Access conditions: Open on Transfer

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