The British Medical Association (BMA) has repeated the warning that GP practices are reaching “a point of no return” after another surgery handed back their contract.

The Department of Health confirmed GPs at Brookeborough and Tempo Practice have given notice of their intention to withdraw from their contract to deliver General Medical Services at the end of the notice period in six months’ time.

A Department spokesperson said the process will now begin “to develop alternative arrangements for these services”.

The spokesperson continued: “The Department wishes to reassure patients that the practice will continue to retain the contract to deliver GP services for the next six months.

“Patients at the practice do not need to take any action. They should continue to contact the practice as normal.

“The Department will be writing out to all practice patients to keep them informed as this process begins.”

Additional information provided by the Department states investment continues into general practice “to help meet increasing demand”.

In addition: “A £5.5m package for general practice was announced in September to help strengthen GP services through the winter period as well as providing help to those practices that are most at risk.

“The package provided targeted help to parts of the service that are most under pressure by investing £1m in a new Attract, Recruit, Retain scheme to help attract GPs in traditionally hard-to-recruit areas.

“As part of this investment package, additional funding is provided to the GP Crisis Response and Improvement Team, which provides support to practices that are experiencing difficulty.”

The Department has also agreed new arrangements with GPs to reduce the administrative burden on practices over the winter and allow them to prioritise care for their patients who most need it, with a particular focus on those in care homes.

More broadly, action has also been taken to support general practice through increasing the number of GP training places in Northern Ireland to an all-time high of 121 in 2022/23.

Looking to the longer term, a review of the GP workforce has been progressing, and the Department will consider the review’s recommendations on the need for GP training places in the future.

The Department has also recently streamlined the processes for GPs qualified in the Republic, as well as Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa to take up roles in Northern Ireland.

In addition, and in recognition of the important role health and social care professionals can play alongside general practice staff in delivering timely and effective patient care, the Department has supported the multi-disciplinary teams model with an additional £1.5m investment this year.

The Western Health and Social Care Trust were asked to comment, but advised this should be addressed by the Department of Health.

It was explained that was under way, and it would be assumed the Western Trust would have been informed of this move on the basis it may be requested to take on the contract, and on that basis, comment would be welcomed.

However, there has been no reply by the time of publishing.

Meanwhile, the BMA NI GP Committee Chair, Dr. Alan Stout, said: “As we have long predicted, practices and GPs in Northern Ireland are getting to a point of no return. The pressure, and the lack of centralised support and planning, is making general practice unsustainable.

“We have a huge workforce crisis, and while we have younger GPs coming into the workforce, we are losing too many older GPs through retirement and burnout.

“We are also struggling to make being a partner seem like an attractive career route. The problems are particularly acute in the west of Northern Ireland as it is even harder to recruit GPs to work in the area, and the risks to other practices of a list dispersal are even more destabilising.

“We need to urgently resolve our workforce crisis and ensure that general practice has a sustainable future.

“We need to address the indemnity issue, stabilise the workload and move away from the narrative that GPs are working ‘part time’, or are closed to patients, when GPs across Northern Ireland are doing the very best they can to meet demand.”