Overstretched services are no longer able to keep up with rising demand: patients face longer waits to see their GPs, who are now conducting 40 million more consultations a year than in 2008; A&E waiting times are some of the worst they've been in a decade; waiting lists are at a recent high with millions of people waiting for treatment in hospital.
The number and proportion of responders with depression who had three more consultations within the past 12 months were: underweight (n = 13, 62%), normal weight (n = 108, 69%), overweight (n = 98, 71%), and obese (n = 112, 72%).
We attempted to analyze separately for one, two, three, four or more consultations but could not establish any gradient (results not shown).
Hardcastle 20 showed people who attended two or more consultations (out of a possible four) increased their total physical activity, stage of change and family social support more than those who attended just one.
In the United Kingdom, policy makers and cancer charities often use a binary measure of promptness of cancer diagnosis comprising one or two (compared with three or more) consultations, for example, in public reporting of NHS patient experience surveys (Department of Health, 2012).
A total of 39 doctors contributed, but six carried out five or more consultations.
Six (11%) patients did not receive any consultation, and 42 (76%) patients received two or more consultations.
We found the lack of privacy during consultations unsettling, particularly when two or more consultations took place in the same room or the same space outdoors.
In instances where a patient had two or more consultations within a day, we conservatively assumed a single consultation took place, to reduce the likelihood of including duplicate records.
