Hundreds of written complaints were made against GP surgeries in Swindon last year.

Across England, many complaints related to difficult communication with surgeries, with the British Medical Association saying issues are caused by doctors too stretched to spend enough time with patients.

The figures are published as the Swindon Clinical Commissioning Group deals with the fallout of the IMH fiasco which is still affecting five practices in the town.

NHS Digital figures show that 276 written complaints were made against doctors’ surgeries in the NHS Swindon CCG in 2018-19.

Of them, 38 per cent were fully upheld, and 9 per cent partially upheld.

The most common reason for complaints against GP surgeries in the area was staff attitude.

Administrative staff including receptionists were the most common subject of complaints, mentioned in 39 per cent of new cases – followed by GPs (29 per cent) and cases in which no staff were involved or staff were categorised as other (22 per cent).

Across England, nearly 93,000 complaints were made against primary care givers in 2018-19.

The British Medical Association’s GP committee chair, Dr Richard Vautrey, said: “This survey shows much of the dissatisfaction felt by patients stems from communication problems, rather than clinical errors, and doctors know that they simply don’t have enough time to spend with their patients and cope with rising demand, with the risk that communication issues could arise.

“All clinicians want to do their jobs safely, but need the time, resources and funding to be able to do that.”

Victoria Cross Surgery in Victoria Road received 35 written complaints last year. Of 36 resolved, 12 were fully upheld and six partially.

NHS dentists in the Swindon CCG received a further 29 written complaints in 2018-19 – 26 were fully upheld and two partially.

Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, chairwoman of the Royal College of GPs, said: “GPs and their teams see over a million patients every day, and we actively encourage patients to submit feedback and raise complaints if they are not satisfied with any aspect of the care they’ve received so that we can continue to improve all aspects of our service.

“We know from the last independent GP patient survey that the great majority of patients have a good experience of general practice, and this demonstrates the hard work and dedication of GPs and their teams who are working tirelessly to deliver high quality care, in every corner of the country.

“As a profession, we are facing immense workforce pressures with a huge increase in patient numbers coupled with a shortage of doctors to care for them. Inevitably, this will occasionally impact on the service we can deliver, and this can be frustrating for patients – and for GPs.”

While NHS Digital said that data quality issues meant complaints could not be compared year-on-year, the figures show that 336 written complaints were submitted against GPs in the Swindon CCG in 2017-18, and 30 against dentists.