Fall in patient satisfaction in England is linked to fewer GPs and less face-to-face contact, research finds

Increasing access to general practice through tools such as remote consultations is likely to reduce continuity of care and patient satisfaction, researchers have concluded.

A report by the Institute for Government examined the factors behind waning patient satisfaction with GP services in England.1 Results from the national GP patient survey show that the proportion of patients reporting a “fairly good” or “very good” experience of general practice fell by 17.1 percentage points (ppt) from 88.4% in 2012 to 71.3% in 2023.

It concluded that more GPs per patient (particularly GP partners), a higher proportion of face-to-face appointments, and smaller patient list sizes were most likely to improve patients’ experience of general practice. But it said that all three of these trends had been going in “the wrong direction” nationally.

Conversely, it said, the last government’s flagship policy of massively expanding the number of additional roles in the primary care workforce beyond GPs and nurses “has coincided with the largest drop in patient satisfaction on record.”