Contacting GPs Through E-Mail is a Disaster in Waiting, Say Experts

Even as the NHS in Britain is considering a new policy that could see patients contact their GPs through email, a number of health experts have warned that it could prove to be very costly for both the health service and more importantly to the patients who will have to describe their symptoms through emails.

One of the major part of examining a patient is the GPs physically checking every sign and symptom experienced by the patient. While the new procedure does free up some of the GPs' time to look after more seriously ill patients, health experts say that they will have no choice but to take the symptoms given by the patients at its face value, the Daily Mail newspaper reported.

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has already made his intentions clear that he wants the GPs to have a greater say on how the majority of the NHS budget is spent. The reason given by Lansley is that GPs are in a greater contact with their patients and understand their needs better than the policy makers who hardly check on any patients.

However if such a procedure is pushed through, then not only will the GPs lose touch with their patients, they are likely to miss out on small difference between the actual symptoms and that what is written in the email which could prove to be the difference between two separate diseases.


Source: Medindia