Medscape's latest UK Doctors' Salary and Satisfaction report suggests only small rises in income over the past 2 years, and a significant gender pay gap.
Based on online survey responses from 1022 fulltime practising doctors, GPs' average full-time earnings for last year were nearly flat while specialists suffered an average £1000 a year pay cut.
GP's median earnings dropped by £10,000 to £90,000 while specialists' median pay rose by £5000 to £100,000.
Sixty-seven percent of GPs and 59% of specialists said they weren't paid enough.
Pay Gaps
The gender pay gap for GPs in 2018 was 26% in favour of male doctors – a slight improvement on 29% in 2016.
Female specialists took home 38% less than men – a big improvement on the 56% gap in 2016.
Despite this, women doctors were only slightly less likely (38%) than men (41%) to be content with their wages.
Our data also show an ethnicity pay gap. Asian/Asian British GPs and specialists overall earned around £21,000 a year less than their white counterparts.
Consultation Time
The Royal College of GPs has called for standard 15 minute appointments to replace the current 10 minute slots. Our survey found 9-12 minutes was the average consultation time for 71% of GPs.
Male doctors were more likely to do 9-12 minute consultations, and more female doctors did 13-16 minute sessions.
Seeing patients accounted for 33 hours of the working week for male GPs, 30 hours for women GPs. Paperwork and admin took up around 15 hours a week for nearly half (48%) of doctors.
Job Challenges
Seventy percent of those responding to our survey work solely in the NHS and NHS-related challenges headed our list of work-related problems.
Eighty-one percent said working in the NHS had become harder.
Workload and staffing levels were cited as doctors' top challenges (50%), followed by NHS rules and regulations (20%).
These dominated over other practice issues like difficult patients (9%) and long working hours (8%).
Staffing and workload issues were more of a concern for specialists (51%) than GPs (40%).
Overall these concerns were 3% higher than our 2016 data.
Personal comments given included:
"Staggering staffing shortages, working long hours and burnout. Physical and mental stresses."
"Emotional exhaustion."
"Dealing with difficult colleagues."
"Bullying/undermining at work, worries about career progression and training."
"Poor management, dysfunctional department."
"Dealing with incompetent managers and idiotic government regulations."
Many have just had enough, with 31% saying they were thinking of moving to practise abroad. However, Brexit uncertainty was not as big a driver as you might think. Leaving the EU may change plans for 9% of overseas doctors working in the UK. That compared with 30% in 2016.
Twenty eight percent of doctors said they were considering doing more private work.
Positive Aspects of Being a Doctor
Being a doctor can still be rewarding, our survey found. For 36% the most rewarding aspect was being good at what they do, finding answers and diagnoses. Gratitude of patients was next at 22%, then at 21% "knowing that I'm making the world a better place".
Nearly two thirds (61%) would chose medicine as a career again.
Younger doctors, women, and GPs were less likely to pick the same career. Most doctors (77%) would select the same specialty or practice setting.
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Cite this: Tim Locke. Little Change in UK Doctors' Earnings: Medscape Survey - Medscape - Jun 05, 2019.
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