[Margaret Pilkington]

Originally Posted by Exile on Spencer St

Surely the problem that needs addressing is not the healthy people who don't go to their GPs in five years or more, nor the people who've moved, died or otherwise disappeared.
The problem is that GP's (private businesses contracted to, not part of, the NHS) get £136 per name on a list that's obviously not kept up-to-date by GPs (and why would it?).
Why not simply pay these private medical practitioners for every consultation they undertake? Every visit to a GP requires an appointment, that's recorded somewhere, so how difficult is it to count up the appointments and pay an agreed sum for each? Keep the GP registers based on a rough target of a certain number of patients per doctor, so patients have some certainty of getting an appointment. But there needs to be some incentive for GPs to keep 'their' lists of patients up-to-date.

Your solution would not compromise the patients. The additional advantage is that it would cost less to administer too.
This news may make healthy people seek an appointment that they do not really need just so that they have been seen by a GP in the last five years....thereby depriving those who need medical care.