Will the primary care access plan for England really deliver?

The government’s long promised plan for recovering access to primary care in England, published on 9 May, is designed to “tackle the 8 am rush and make it easier and quicker for patients to get the help they need from primary care.”1 The focus is on general practice, supported by community pharmacy, with proposals to recover access to dentistry not due to be published until later this year.General practices in England delivered more appointments than ever before in March 2023, 20% more than in the same month in 2019.2 But it’s clear that despite this growth in activity, demand still outstrips capacity. Although satisfaction with the care received from general practice remains high, satisfaction with access has fallen to its lowest ever level.3So will this plan deliver the change the public, the government, and the professions themselves want to see? As ever with such plans, it brings together a series…
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