Longer booking intervals in general practice: effects on doctors' stress and arousal

A controlled trial was carried out to determine whether longer booking intervals at surgeries affected general practitioners' self-assessed levels of stress and arousal. Sixteen general practitioners from 10 practices took part. Surgery sessions with patients booked at 10 minute intervals (experimental sessions) were compared with the doctors' usual booking intervals of between 7.5 and 5.0 minutes (control sessions). Stress and arousal were assessed by the general practitioner before and after each surgery session using a mood adjective check list. The study included 109 experimental and 184 control sessions. The median consultation length increased from six minutes in the control sessions to seven minutes in the experimental sessions. At the end of the experimental sessions, stress scores were lower, and arousal scores higher than at the end of the control sessions (P less than 0.001). There were no significant differences between experimental and control sessions in stress or arousal at the start of the sessions. Favourable mood changes were seen more consistently in the experimental sessions than control sessions, with less than a quarter of doctors showing increased stress or decreased arousal after sessions relative to before. It is concluded that longer booking intervals are of psychological advantage to general practitioners.