Dr Wasson insisted that her patient be admitted within the next 30 minutes even if it meant taking her to casualty. She received a call back from ambulance control to say that this was impossible as there were no free ambulances available. Dr Wasson finally called ambulance control to say that she was updating her request to a 999 call which they were required to respond to immediately. His average working week is around 80 hours often involving 14-hour days that might begin with a morning surgery at 08.30am and end with a home visit to a patient in the early evening. He often arrives home at 10pm, sometimes too exhausted to eat.
Patients arrive with large agendas and often want advice on a number of different issues.
You can't do all that within the confines of a 10-minute appointment. The pamphlet also explains what happened to a patient after Dr Philip McCarthy of Bristol referred him to a memory clinic at the local hospital. He received a letter from the hospital consultant saying the service had been withdrawn from patients who lived in that part of Bristol due to lack of funding. Despite certain criticisms of government policy, sections of the BMA leadership support the further introduction of the private sector into health care. At present, full-time NHS consultants are contracted to work in the public health system for 35 hours a week, although many put in much longer hours.