GPs working in NASGP’s seven regional ICB partnerships have worked 15% more sessions year on year, according to original LocumDeck data.
GPs worked 14.5% more sessions and 16% more hours in regional partnerships in May 2024 compared with May 2023.
The number of practices registered on LocumDeck also grew by 20% in these areas during the same 12-month period.
These findings come at a time when industry titles and the BMA have voiced concerns about the availability of sessional GP work and locum employment in the UK. The Daily Mail and the i paper have been the latest titles to cover the GP funding crisis after picking up on a report about a doctor who now drives an Uber.
Some have suggested that a lack of funding has decreased available sessional work but earlier the NASGP told Pulse that instead a 30% increase in GP locums over the last five years may have led to increased competition.
NASGP works with ICBs across England in Suffolk, Hertfordshire, Essex, Gloucestershire, Buckinghams hire, Oxfordshire, West Berkshire and Frimley to support local GPs and practices.
Dr Richard Fieldhouse, NASGP chair, said: “It’s clear from our data that, in areas of the country where LocumDeck has been adopted widely by GP locums and practices, that the use of GP locums to support practices is higher than ever.
“And because of LocumDeck, practice managers can book GP locums in real-time, cutting through so much of the usual hassle of hiring GP locums via methods like Whatsapp, traditional agencies and job adverts.
“Much close collaboration with forward-thinking ICBs, local LMCs, VTS schemes and local enthusiastic GPs, has really helped cement these partnerships, so that practices in these areas get the support they need. Whether by design or through its remarkable efficacy, NASGP’s LocumDeck platform is ensuring that, certainly in these areas, GP locums are an intrinsic part of the local GP workforce.”
