My G.P is dangerously useless

I admit some doctors can be a bit sketchy but the vast majority are very good.

Bad experiences with doctors:
Had a lump on my forehead, went to the doctor and all she did was poke it and ask if I prayed

What the...? They're not meant to force their views on to you like that.

I think commonwealth medical school are constrained in the amount of knowledge they can give to their students in 5 or 6 years, Those that have honors in a hard or soft sciences and a medical degree are equipped with adequete knowledge.

Funny thing is that in Canada you do a bachelors degree then your medical degree, then 3 years family medicine training. Which is the same time as it takes in the UK, in some case less time. Only difference is they spend less time learning medicine. The vast majority of your medical knowledge comes from postgraduate training which is as vigorous in he UK as anywhere else in the world. In Austria for example if you want to be a GP you don't have any training in primary care. In Canada it only takes 3 years post graduation - in the UK it's a minimum of 5 years.

I've rad his thread right from the beginning and all it seems to show is anecdotal evidence and personal grudges against GPs.

Doctors are one of the most highly regulated professions in the country with annual appraisals and revalidation every 5 years. Without all this you cannot get a liscense to practice.

We all know there are some bad doctors - same as any profession. The difference with doctors is that if folks disagree with an opinion they often find it difficult to deal with. This is perhaps a cultural problem and a NHS problem. If you get rid of the NHS patients would be free to move around to whichever GP or specialist they want. Perhaps then he public would start to have an understanding of the true value of primary care?

My GP went to my Grandma's house last year when she was seriously ill, struggling to speak and incapable of doing anything. The GP said she had a serious case of the flu and should remain on the sofa.

6 hours later she died on the same sofa.

If she was that ill, why did no-one call an ambulance out instead?

Well, she was one of the fittest woman in our family, even at 62. Sounds silly but she was a non smoker, non drinker, she had no weight issues at all. She'd been to the doctors once or twice in her whole life, down to the fact that she doesn't like to moan about little things or the fact that she was never ill.

So trying to get her off the sofa and to a hospital was impossible (or to ring for the ambulance). They lived in a very quiet area, some way from the City. The GP was just a street or two away. Plus it all happened so quickly.

6 hours is hardly quick, an ambulance should have been called. Granted the GP should have spotted pneumonia but the public needs the common sense of when to ring an ambulance.

ME - I went to the GP on Thurs with horrendous pain in bum. He didn't even look just told me I had bruised my coccyx. On Sat was in hospital getting an emergency operation for pilonidal sinus.

It wasn't pneumonia. She had a stroke. 6 hours was quick... She went from waking up, singing, cleaning, dancing, to sitting on the sofa after feeling dizzy and never standing back up. After 2 hours she couldn't speak properly and after 3 hours she was writing like a 3 year old child. And then...

6 hours is definitely a long time for a stroke! If you were noticing serious issues with speech and coordination, there is undoubtedly something more than the flu going on.

But you said the serious symptoms arose after the GP visited. The GP can only analyse what is there at the time -- if symptoms change, that is up to you to report.

Nah, the GP arrived at around the time she couldn't get her words out or stand up apparently. Tbh, I didn't think / want to get into this so much. All we know is that the GP and my grandad to an extent should have dragged her to the hospital, no matter how long the drive was.

And instead you think the GP decided simply not to? I find it hard to believe it's as black and white as you say it was.