Successful “crisis management” has prevented a meltdown of practice numbers in Northern Ireland, doctors’ leaders say.

The region had 12 practices hand back contracts in the last year – but 11 of them were saved, the British Medical Association says. The figures from the quarterly General Medical Services Statistics for Northern Ireland show there were 318 GP practices in Northern Ireland in December last year, one fewer than the same time the previous year. However in December 2018, the number was 333.

Dr Alan Stout, chair of BMA Northern Ireland’s general practitioners committee, pointed out that an “immense amount of work has gone into protecting GP services”. He said: “Despite 12 contract hand-backs, a service for patients has been maintained in all but one of these practices. This is true firefighting and crisis management, and we now have to make sure that we have a long term stabilisation plan to sustain the service. We are also seeing a steady increase in the number of patients registered in each practice, but funding is not matching this increase.”

He stated that this unprecedented level of contract hand-backs is due to a lack of staff and resources to deal with the workload. “The past six months in general practice have been some of the most stressful the profession has gone through,” he added.

The BMA believes that the present situation could have been avoided had action been taken a decade ago, when the alarm was raised. Dr Stout said: “Becoming a GP partner with its associated responsibilities is no longer an attractive career option. A part-time GP in Northern Ireland actually works 40 hours a week, which you simply would not class as part-time in any other profession. The narrative that GPs are closed and not seeing patients is simply not true and is demoralising.”

The Department of Health in Northern Ireland must launch urgent interventions to stop the level of contract hand-backs, he warned.