Are more patients visiting the emergency department at Great Western Hospital because they can’t see a GP?

That’s one theory put forward by a Labour councillor as to why the casualty ward at the hospital has seen a significant increase in visitors in the summer just gone.

It was suggested after Kevin McNamara, director of strategy and community  at the GWH NHS Foundation Trust updated the borough council’s  Adults' Care, Health and Housing Overview and Scrutiny committee.

He said: “There has been an increase in Emergency Department attendance from 6,177 in July 2017 to 7,272 in July 2018 – a significant upsurge and only partly explained by the hot weather.

"This means the Trust will have seen an 10 per cent increase in attendance this year compared with 2017.”

In July, Mr McNamara added, 91.8 per cent of patients at the emergency ward were seen, admitted or treated within four hours, against a national target of 95 per cent.

He said, combined with the increase in people presenting themselves at the emergency department, “the performance improvement is good work by the trust and shows the improvements being made.”

Labour councillor Bob Wright, the chairman of the committee asked: “Is there a relationship between doctor availability and the increasing numbers at the Emergency Department?

“If people can’t get an appointment with a doctor, do they then go to the emergency department so they will be seen?”

Mr McNamara said: “There is something to suggest that the more difficulty people have in getting primary care, the more they rely on the Emergency Department.

“For a direct link – that for every one GP fewer there is that equals X more people in the Emergency Department we don’t have that data.

“Some people might think it’s quicker to come to the Ed. Some people just think they pay their taxes and it’s their right to come to the Emergency Department to be seen.”

Graphs provided to the Advertiser by the Swindon NHS Clinical Commissioning Group, show there has been quite a fluctuation in GP numbers in Swindon recently.

Numbers grew rapidly between December 2016 to March 2017, rising from 140 to 160. But there was a sharp drop back to 140 by September 2017.

Those numbers have recovered slightly but were still below 150 by March 2018.

For nurses working in primary care, there were more than 100 in September 2015, but that dropped towards just over 90 by December. There has been an increase back to 100 by March.