Doctor's diary: Swine flu

By Dr Reggie Sangha

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Dr Reggie Sangha: "Phone calls are rising exponentially"

Swine flu has made it her busiest time in nine years as a GP, says Dr Reggie Sangha.

Certainly in the last few weeks we've noticed a huge rise in the number of worried patients phoning us or coming into the surgery and asking for advice about swine flu, and we have seen cases of swine flu as well.

There's understandably a high level of concern amongst the public. On a day-to-day basis, this has made the working life of a GP very busy - it's always been busy, but now it's exponentially busy.

My simple take home message is that the majority of people that contract swine flu will recover with or without tamiflu and it's actually a small minority of people that are unfortunately getting very unwell from this.

The other thing that I would say to patients is if you have an underlying illness such as asthma or diabetes or if for example you're pregnant or there's a child under the age of five then it's very much worth contacting your GP or NHS Direct for further advice.

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