COUNCILLORS have criticised NHS Somerset bosses for claiming that patients are now better able to see their GP face to face.

Officials from the health agency told a Somerset Council committee meeting patients in the county were enjoying ‘above average’ standards of care.

They said there were now a large amount of same-day appointments, and there was a sharp increase in using the NHS app for appointments and prescriptions.

It was said patient surveys consistently put Somerset ‘in the top five nationally’ for satisfaction, with 80 per cent of people finding it easy to contact their GP practice.

Somerset ranked in the top 10 nationally for overall patient satisfaction with 77 per cent rating their GP surgery as ‘good’ or ‘very good’, compared to a UK average of 75 per cent.

About 45 per cent of appointments took place on the same day, and another 40 per cent within two weeks.

But, committee chairman Cllr Gill Slocombe dismissed the claim of 45 per cent of same-day appointments as ‘not true in the real world’, though she wished it was.

Cllr Slocombe said even if the NHS figures were true, it still left 15 per cent of patients waiting three weeks or longer for appointments.

She said: “I do not wish to be negative, but I think we want better, that is the message.

“The service is not consistent across doctors’ surgeries.

“What we need to do is to bring the service at every surgery up to the same standard, so no matter where you live, rural or urban, you get the same service.”

NHS Somerset’s primary care manager Luke Best said: “We are very aware things are not perfect.

“We could all sit around this table and talk about personal experiences of ourselves or our neighbours when things have not gone quite so well.”