GPs have questioned the effectiveness of the NHS Direct hotline and said it could be scrapped to reduce health spending.

The NHS has been told to find some £20 billion in savings by 2014. The British Medical Association claimed that the telephone service delayed patients getting healthcare.

Speaking at an annual conference in London, Dr Laurence Buckman, chairman of the BMA`s GPs committee, highlighted the telephone service rather than the website provided by NHS Direct.

He said the service was an "interposition" between the patient and healthcare that stopped them from speaking to nurses and ended up an expensive telephone service.

People would be able to use their out-of-hours GP service if the hotline was scrapped, he said.

Dr Buckman added that new hospital building schemes and some "unnecessary" tiers of management could also be cut to save money.

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www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/ (NHS Direct)

A public consultation on access to GPs and the provision of out-of-hours care has been launched by the British Medical Association.

Officials hope the move will increase debate about the future of the services and the NHS in general, both of which could be hit hard by a looming round of cuts in public spending.

Dr Laurence Buckman, Chairman of the BMA`s GPs Committee, said: "There are 300 million consultations in general practice in the UK every year; for most people it`s their only contact with the health service and we want it to work well for them.

"But with so many challenges ahead we need to develop a long-term strategy for general practice now, because there are real tensions between what people say they want the service to provide and what it can provide."

The consultation - Striking a balance: what matters most in general practice? - will run until September 10.

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A leading professor has called for changes to be made to `out-of-hours` care to prevent European doctors flying to the UK to cover weekend shifts.

Professor Steve Field, the head of the Royal College of GPs (RCGP), said concerns have been raised about the quality of care being offered to patients in some parts of the country after an error at a Cambridgeshire health trust.

In 2008, 70-year-old David Gray died after being given a massive dose of painkillers by German doctor Daniel Ubani.

Dr Ubani had flown to the UK to work and later said extreme tiredness and only three hours sleep contributed to his mistake.

In light of the error and increased use of "flying doctors" Prof Field says there needs to be a "radical review".

He said: "Doctors from Europe who come to the UK to work in out-of-hours services must prove they are of the same quality as our home-grown doctors. All UK-trained doctors now have to reach the standard set by the RCGP by passing our examination, which includes spending time in a training practice."

But he warned that European doctors do not necessarily have such rigorous assessments or experience of working in UK practices.

Copyright ┬® Press Association 2009