Close to a fifth of family doctors in the north east are due to retire by the end of next year, heaping “frightening” pressure on an already under-strain health service.
New figures from NHS Grampian show 86 GPs from a workforce of 500 across Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and Moray are expected to walk away by 2016.
They include 32 out of a possible 226 in the city, 34 out of 207 in Aberdeenshire and 20 of the 80 GPs in Moray.
Dr Ken Lawton, president of the north east branch of the Royal College of General Practitioners Scotland, said the numbers quitting were twice the level he would have expected.
He said: “The figures are surprising. To lose around 20% of the workforce is a frightening situation and I thought the figure would be nearer 10%.
“I am surprised and worried that the figure is so high.
“To train a GP from medical student to independent GP takes around 12 years. You can see the pressures that we are under.”
Practices in north Aberdeen, south Aberdeenshire and along the Banffshire coast are coming under particular strain, according to doctors responsible for primary care planning.
The forecasts have emerged as NHS Grampian is in the process of devising an urgent plan to meet the needs of 8,000 patients of the Brimmond Medical Group in the city, which will close at the end of September because so many of its GPs are retiring.
Major work is now underway to shake-up services across the north-east.
Health chiefs are looking at bringing less qualified healthcare professionals into surgeries to take on some of the less complex work.
More highly trained nurse practitioners are likely to be drafted in, particularly to aid patients suffering from long-term health conditions, such as diabetes and heart disease.
NHS Grampian has also looked to a system used by Native American Indians in South Alaska for inspiration on how to increase patient care in the community.
The north-east has been particularly hit by the nationwide GP shortage, given the higher living costs in the region and a reluctance to relocate to more rural practices.
Doctors across the area have spoken of their concerns that posts are taking up to six months to fill in Aberdeen and Moray.
In Aberdeenshire, four posts have been vacant for more than six months and have been advertised three times.
Dr Martin McCrone, who practices in Banchory and is clinical lead for Aberdeenshire south, insisted surgeries were still performing well despite the challenges.
He said: “All our practices are still functioning and we still have a very high standard of service.
“However, the practices are under increasing pressure for a variety of reasons. Just as the GP population is aging the general population is aging. There are many more complex illness that are being treated increasingly in a community setting. That puts further pressure on services.
“What we don’t have is the pool of people who can step in and help that process, whether that be locums of people who want to be associates or partners. That is far more reduced .”
Labour MSP Richard Baker said he was concerned about another looming “recruitment crisis” in the health service.
He said: “We have already had a crisis in recruiting hospital consultants and now we have got a GP recruitment crisis. It’s not good enough.
“We already have Brimmond closing and the way things are progressing, others will shut over the next couple of years. This will leave patients in an extremely worrying situation.”
Richard Lochhead, SNP MSP for Moray, said “I know that recruitment of GPs in rural areas across Scotland has been an ongoing issue in recent years, and the fact that so many local GPs in Moray and the wider region are due to retire means that NHS Grampian has to redouble its efforts to ensure patient cover is retained.”
Aberdeen doctors are some of Scotland’s highest earners…
NHS Grampian’s ageing population means it has some of the highest-earning family doctors in Scotland.
GPs are currently entitled to a “seniority payment” when they have worked for more than six years.
The starting figure is £600, building up annually to £10,000 on top of their regular salary.
Three of the GP surgeries in Scotland which paid most in seniority payments between 2013 and 2014 were located in NHS Grampian.
Top of the list was the Peterhead Health Centre, which gave doctors £82,962 in seniority payments.
It was followed by the Inverurie Medical Group, which gave out £70,572.
Skene Medical Group also gave a total of £60,053 to its doctors.
The British Medical Association (BMA) has agreed to review the payments when the current contract between GPs and the Scottish Government ends in March 2017.