416,353 four week waits for a GP appointment in West Sussex last year
West Sussex saw a 42% rise in four week waits for GP appointments last year when compared to 2022, House of Commons Library research commissioned by the Liberal Democrats has revealed.
The NHS data measures the time between when the appointment was booked and when it took place. It showed that the number of appointments that saw patients wait two weeks or longer in West Sussex has spiked by 21% to 1,200,486 in 2023, up from 995,277 the previous year.
It means the proportion of appointments where a patient waited two weeks or longer in West Sussex has risen to 22.1%, up from 19.8% in 2022.
Mid Sussex Liberal Democrats have criticised the Conservative government for letting the community down with their neglect of local health services.
The Liberal Democrats are calling for a legal right to get a GP appointment within seven days, or 24 hours if in urgent need.
The policy would enshrine this right in the NHS Constitution, putting a duty on the government and health service to make sure it happens. It would be achieved by increasing the number of GPs, and increasing the number of nurses and pharmacists fully qualified to prescribe day to day medicines.
Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Mid Sussex, Alison Bennett, said:
“These figures bear out what people across Mid Sussex are telling me each week: that they are struggling to get a GP appointment when they need one. It is causing people huge anxiety because they can't be confident any more of getting the care they need.
“Being able to see a GP when you need to should not be too much to ask, but even on this measure people are being failed after years of neglect by this Conservative government.
“That is why the Liberal Democrats are calling for a legal right for all patients to see their GP within seven days or 24-hours if in urgent need”
Notes:
The data from the House of Commons Library can be found here. The NHS data measures the time between when the appointment was booked and when it took place.
This data measures the time between booking and the appointment taking place. This includes cases where the patient requested a particular date, so it is not a direct measure of “waiting times”.
The data includes all appointments in general practice (including those with e.g. nurses or other staff).
The overall increase in the number of GP appointments in England is important background context for the data, and you should note it whenever you use this data. The overall number of appointments in England was nearly 20 million higher in 2023 than in 2022 (+6%). Column Q in the main data table shows the percentage increase for each sub-ICB location.
The percentages exclude the small number of appointments for which the time between booking and appointment is not known.
This data based on our analysis of the underlying data from NHS Digital’s Appointments in General Practice December 2023 publication.