• The BMA used the term ‘GPs’ but cited data that measures the number of patient encounters at General Practices.
  • Strictly speaking, doctors in GP surgeries do not physically see 200,000 people per week – this figure appears closer to 120,000.
  • However, there is solid evidence that a range of health professionals working in GP surgeries work with 200,000 people per week in person and over the phone.
  • Multi-disciplinary teams (MDTs) at GP surgeries consist of more than General Practitioners and nurses. 
  • Beginning in 2018, MDTs represent an expanded focus on primary care for the health service, in an attempt to make it easier for the public to access physiotherapists, social workers, mental health practitioners and more.

In a post on Instagram on 27 July, the British Medical Association (BMA) Northern Ireland claimed that:

“GPs see over 200,000 patients a week. That’s 10.2 million appointments every year.”

Since this was posted, the News Letter has run a series of articles investigating this claim, including an article on 4 October with this headline:

The article states further that:

“Doctors’ union the BMA has been urged to correct a ‘misleading’ claim that GPs in Northern Ireland conduct 200,000 appointments per week, despite that number being contradicted by official data.

“Recent figures from Stormont’s health department show only 123,926 telephone or face to face encounters between doctors and their patients in June – but the union has defended their figures, saying they reflect ‘the true multidisciplinary nature of modern general practice’.”

The word “misleading” in both the headline and the first paragraph is quoting a comment from TUV Cllr Allister Kyle in the piece.

So, what’s going on here? Is the BMA correct? Is the News Letter?

In some ways, they both are. However, based on the available evidence it is not accurate to suggest that General Practitioners consult with – or “see” – 200,000 people per week.

Instead, the evidence shows that General Practice settings have 200,000 “patient encounters” – meaning interactions, in person or the phone, that are of some clinical relevance between members of the public and health and social care professionals working within General Practices.

These professionals can include GPs themselves, as well as nurses, physiotherapists, social workers, mental health practitioners and more. In the past ten years, General Practices have expanded their remit by the creation of Multidisciplinary Teams (MDTs) that were designed to help the public access various health and social care services more easily.

Our rating for the BMA’s claim is Inaccurate With Consideration. This still acknowledges that the 200,000 per week figure is based on real numbers, but nevertheless it is not the case that this amount of people have consultations with their General Practitioner each week.

Read on to find out more about what these numbers do mean and how some local health services have changed since 2018.

  • Source

FactCheckNI contacted both the BMA and the News Letter about these claims.

The BMA replied to us saying that they stand by the accuracy of their comments which reflect the multidisciplinary nature of modern General Practice. Their comments are included in full later in this article.

The News Letter – more of whom’s reporting will follow throughout this article – is, at the time of writing, yet to respond.

  • Figures and context

The term ‘GPs’ is widely understood to be an acronym for General Practitioners.

In March 2024, the NI Audit Office (NIAO) published a report, Access to General Practice in Northern Ireland, which includes a section with the heading:

Around 200,000 consultations were undertaken each week in general practice in 2022-23

At face value, that sounds like a full endorsement of the original claim by the BMA. But is it quite so straightforward? Where does this number come from, and what is it counting?

The Strategic Planning and Performance Group (SPPG) within the Department of Health (DoH) began collecting weekly consultation data from General Practices in October 2020. It includes both telephone and face-to-face consultations. No equivalent data is available before this date.

From October 2020 to September 2021, the data covered General Practitioners and practice nurses only.

Beginning in October 2021, data collection expanded to include the “whole practice team, including GPs, nurses (practice based and treatment room nurses) and other MDT staff”. The data is not broken down by specific job role.

“MDT staff” refers to specialist members of Multidisciplinary Teams who are based in GP practices. This could include: physiotherapists, mental health practitioners, social workers, health visitors, and district nurses. Every GP practice also has a pharmacist working as part of their clinical team. In addition, a number of paramedics work with GP practices across Northern Ireland to clinically assess housebound patients referred by a GP.

MDTs began rolling out in 2018 as part of the wider transformation of the health service in Northern Ireland, with the aim of bringing medical care closer to patients, reducing the needs for referrals and appointments elsewhere.

This is part of the wider shift in approach within Health and Social Care, suggested in various strategic documents like 2011’s Transforming Your Care, the 2014 Donaldson report and the Bengoa report of 2016, and ultimately set in motion in Health and Wellbeing 2026 – Delivering Together, the current 10-year health strategy published in October 2016.

Currently, there are 368 MDT staff across 117 GP practices in NI, delivering care to  delivering care to more than 760,000 patients – just over a third of those registered. 

Minister for Health, Mike Nesbitt said previously that MDTs provided an additional 335,000 patient consultations in GP settings in 2024-25.

It is clear from the table in the Audit Office’s report that the number of weekly consultations in general practice increased when MDT staff were included in the data collection. Indeed, this is the issue that lies at the heart of this claim – what type of interaction should we be counting?

Figure 1 – source: NIAO

Before examining what constitutes a proper interaction with General Practice, it’s worth noting that the starting point for both the BMA claim and the News Letter criticism of that claim is this rather wonky data.

The NIAO was clear that the change in data collection methodology makes it difficult to track progress over time, and it also noted that the DoH accepts “the need to quantify more accurately the volume and diversity of activity undertaken in general practice.”

Following publication of the NIAO report, then Permanent Secretary of DoH Peter May told a 6 March meeting of the Public Accounts Committee that there were 200,000 “patient encounters” per week in General Practice. In the discussion that followed, he also noted the need to improve and refine data collection.

  • BMA in Northern Ireland

On 4 July 2025, BMA NI announced that GPs in Northern Ireland had voted in favour of taking collective action in response to the 2025/26 contract, which they said did not provide enough funding for general practice.

GPs had asked the Department of Health for an additional £80 million and had received £1 million. Almost 80% of GP partners who are BMA members took part in the ballot, 98.7% of which voted in favour of action.

The BMA released a statement saying the increased funding was “essential for GPs who are facing rising costs and increasing demand, putting additional pressure on an already stressed workforce.” It went on to say that “200,000 appointments are delivered every week, that is 10% of the population seeing their GP every week.”

A number of posters were produced as part of this BMA campaign. On 27 July, one of these was posted as an image on their Instagram – and is the original claim in this article.

Figure 2 – source: BMA

  • News Letter coverage

On 9 August, the News Letter published an article in response to BMA NI. The Department of Health had provided the newspaper with more granular data, extrapolated from submissions by 252 practices, to estimate activity across all practices in Northern Ireland in June. 

The main points of contention raised by the newspaper were:

  • The figures relied on “encounters” not appointments.
  • They include contacts with staff outside GPs practices, such as counsellors and pharmacists.
  • Many of these encounters are over the telephone rather than face to face.
  • Patients could be counted twice on one day if they are triaged by telephone by a clinician and seen face-to-face later that day.
  • DoH officials said that the average weekly number for “all encounters across all GP Practices was approximately 193,081” in  which “includes contacts with nurses, multidisciplinary teams and other non-practice clinical staff” – while the number of encounters with General Practitioners only was 123,926 per week.”

We contacted the Belfast News Letter for further information and have not yet received a reply. However, DoH sent us the data for June that they originally sent the News Letter.

Many of these criticisms simply reflect the content of the NIAO report, while the term “encounters” was used by the DoH Permanent Secretary at the Public Accounts Committee alongside the 200,000-per-week figure.

However, there is one major difference. The NIAO report in March 2024. said that data was not collected by job role and that data collection should be improved. It seems that, given what the department told the News Letter, by June 2025 DoH had begun to disaggregate the data by job role. We asked DoH when this practice began but have not yet received a reply. 

The other piece of information not in the NIAO report is that patients may be double counted if they have two clinical contacts with a GP practice on a given day. 

The DoH also told the News Letter and us that the data it collects is “based on the numbers of encounters (not appointments) as recorded in Practice Clinical Systems by the corresponding healthcare professional role. An encounter refers to a recorded interaction in the clinical record between a patient and the corresponding healthcare professional role. The data only presents face to face and telephone encounters. There are other encounter types recorded in the clinical record.”

According to the News Letter report, the Department said further that the data “does not reflect all activity carried out in General Practice, only those recorded as encounters, nor does it take account of how long the encounter lasts or the complexity.”

Moreover, that the data “does not reflect all activity carried out in General Practice, only those recorded as encounters, nor does it take account of how long the encounter lasts or the complexity.” We can surmise then that the figures do not include paperwork, contacts with reception staff and any other ad hoc patient contacts with GPs and clinical staff.

This information was not in the public domain when BMA NI began its campaign. The job role snapshot data for June is still not publicly available.

  • Further coverage

On 12 August, the News Letter published an article querying this claim, which reported that the BMA had taken this 200,000 figure from the NIAO report as well as evidence supplied to the Public Accounts Committee at Stormont outlined above. The headline for this article reads:

“BMA claim that 200,000 people see their GP each week in Northern Ireland is ‘debunked’ – DUP MLA”

The DUP MLA in question, Diane Dodds, is quoted within the article as saying that the inclusion of wider MDT contacts “within the figures for direct GP appointments is misleading and inaccurate.”

On 4 October, another News Letter article carried the headline (seen at the start of this article):

BMA union doubles down on ‘misleading’ claim that Northern Ireland GPs carry out ‘200,000 appointments per week.’

The report quotes UUP health spokesperson Alan Chambers MLA saying that “it’s simply not the case to say 200,000 patients see their GP every week” and TUV chairman Councillor Allister Kyle describing the BMA figures as “misleading” and “propaganda.”

  • BMA NI response

FactCheckNI asked the BMA about these issues. They replied by pointing out the multidisciplinary nature of modern general practice:

“With reference to the 200,000 patient encounters per week, we maintain that this figure accurately reflects the volume of appointments and services delivered by general practice teams each week. While the Department of Health and the NI Audit Office note that data collection has expanded to include the entire practice team, it is important to recognise that this reflects the true multidisciplinary nature of modern general practice.

“The BMA believes it is both accurate and fair to refer to these patient interactions—whether with a GP, nurse, or another member of the team—as “appointments,” as each represents a direct patient-facing service, consultation, or intervention provided through general practice.

“Furthermore, the 200,000 figure serves to illustrate the extensive workload and reach of general practice, highlighting that roughly 10% of the population receives care or consults with a general practice team member each week. Whether that contact is with a GP or another qualified practice-based clinician, the fundamental point remains: general practice provides an essential and substantial volume of patient care, supporting the health needs of communities at a significant scale.”

On 30 October 2025, BMA NI posted a revised version of the poster on Instagram, which said “GP Practice Contacts Stand at 200,000 per year. 10.2 million. Equivalent to every person in Northern Ireland having a GP consult once every two and a half months.”

This is certainly a more precise version than the original poster – this amendment and clarification results in a message that is supported by evidence. FactCheckNI welcomes this adjustment. 

  • Analysis

“GPs see over 200,000 patients a week”. – certainly there are some grounds for confusion here.

Back in March 2024, the NIAO was satisfied that “Around 200,000 consultations were undertaken each week in general practice in 2022-23”. And, following the publication of that report, the then DoH Permanent Secretary was happy to tell a Stormont committee that there were 200,000 “patient encounters” per week in General Practice.

However, it remains the case that seeing a physiotherapist or social worker is not the same as seeing their GP.

Note that the BMA’s claim is for “over” 200,000 such encounters per week. The figures for 2022-23 suggest there were “around” 200,000. However, the claim was made in July 2025 and this number may have risen since then but, as yet, FactCheckNI has not been able to secure equivalent figures covering all of this year.

If that satisfies your own meaning of the words “GPs see patients” then this is fine. If you take a stricter view, then it might not be. Do our local General Practitioners carry out an average of over 200,000 consultant appointments with individual people every week? Not according to the available figures.

It is impossible to properly discuss the veracity of the claim and counterclaim here without examining some semantics. Does an appointment with a practice nurse count as an appointment (or “encounter”) with your GP? What about MDT physiotherapists or mental health workers or social workers?

In some ways, these questions simply boil down to what is meant by GP – is it the General Practice, or is it the General Practitioner?

The Belfast News Letter was interested in how many appointments doctors in GP practices had per week. The Department of Health told them that in June (presumably 2025) there were 123,926 weekly patent encounters specifically with GP doctors.

Note that this figure, for June of this year, might not be representative of other months – and is in fact unlikely to be so, given the well-established reality of winter pressures within the health service.

BMA NI were keen to highlight how many encounters the wider clinician team in GP practices had every week. Due to the increase of Multidisciplinary Teams as part of transforming the primary health system in Northern Ireland, many GP practices now include physiotherapists, mental health practitioners, social workers, pharmacists, health visitors, district nurses, practice nurses and others.

MDTs have been folded into the GP system over the past seven years and it would be remiss to ignore this work as part of the overall General Practice workload. BMA NI never claimed specifically that doctors alone held 200,000 weekly appointments with patents. Their language was looser: “200,000 appointments are delivered every week”, or “GPs see over 200,000 patients a week?” Their position is that including weekly encounters with the whole clinical team gives a more accurate and up to date sense of GP practice activity. 

On the other hand, the News Letter’s position relies on interpreting the words “GPs see patients” as members of the public getting an appointment with their GP, which isn’t exactly an outrageous position either.

One further point to note – and this one was not picked up by the News Letter, as far as we could see – it might be the case that over 200,000 encounters between General Practices and members of the NI public take place each week, but this does not necessarily mean that 200,000 different individuals access some form of support within General Practice each week. Sometimes the same person is responsible for several different encounters (note we made a similar point in a previous fact check when looking at health waiting lists – there is a difference between the number of cases and the number of individual patients).

FactCheckNI’s view is that someone having a “patient encounter” with someone within General Practice “teams” – which could be with a physio or social worker or mental health support worker – is not the same thing as someone seeing their GP (meaning their General Practitioner, either in person or over the phone).

For this reason, we find the initial claim is not supported by evidence – albeit the 200,000 per week figure is based on a real statistic that is of real importance when looking at the workload of primary care in Northern Ireland.

Hopefully by reading this fact check you’ll know a lot more about the different statistics and competing claims (and, help us all, semantics) in an extremely important area of policy and public service that affects the lives of everyone living here.

As fact checkers, we agree strongly with the NI Audit Office’s Report recommendation:

“There is a clear need to improve the collection of activity data in general practice, both to better understand the volume and nature of activity and to inform decision making. While we acknowledge the Department’s intentions in this regard, this should be taken forward as a matter of urgency.”