# Is a private GP worth it? — Dr Ben Ingram > Source: https://drbeningram.com/article-private-gp-worth-it > The usual test is how often you see a doctor, which is the wrong question. Dr Ben Ingram sets out the real one: what late costs you, and what a doctor who already knows you can do about it. Proactive medicine Dr Ben Ingram Reviewed 10 July 2026 # Is a private GP worth it? It depends on which question you are asking. If you are counting how many appointments you will use, you are pricing convenience, and the answer is usually no. The better question is what it costs to find something late, and what a doctor who knows you before anything is wrong can do about it. Almost every article on this subject asks how often you need to see a doctor. That is reactive logic, and it quietly assumes the only thing a doctor does is respond to problems you bring them. Answer it that way and a healthy 45-year-old always concludes no, right up until the year they conclude otherwise. ## What late actually costs Nearly everything that shortens a life in this country builds slowly and silently. Blood pressure creeps up over a decade. Insulin resistance sets in years before a blood sugar reading crosses a line. Cholesterol particles do their damage to arteries long before any symptom appears. Not one of these hurts. Not one of them makes you book an appointment. By the time they announce themselves, the easy options have usually gone. A rising blood pressure caught at 45 is a conversation about salt, sleep, and exercise. The same trend found at 60, after a stroke, is a different life. The cost of late is not measured in appointments. It is measured in the options you no longer have. ## Why a normal result is not the same as a safe one Reference ranges are built around populations, not around you. Your kidney function can fall by a third and still sit inside the normal range. Your fasting glucose can climb steadily for six years and never trigger a flag. Each result, read on its own, looks fine. Read as a line, the same results tell a story. Nobody sees the line unless somebody is holding the previous results and looking for it. That is not a test you can buy. It is a doctor, over time. ## What a doctor who already knows you can do When your child is unwell and I have examined that child before, I know their baseline. I know how they look when they are well. Twelve minutes is enough for me to tell you, with authority, whether this waits until morning. A doctor meeting them for the first time needs half an hour and often ends up sending you somewhere, because there is nothing to reason from. The same is true of you. A chest pain in someone whose ECG, blood pressure profile, and cardiovascular risk I already hold is a very different clinical problem from a chest pain in a stranger. Continuity is not a comfort. It is diagnostic information, and it is the single thing general practice has lost. ## When the NHS is enough, and I will say so If you are young, well, and not carrying much family risk, the NHS will look after you competently, and paying me to watch you would mostly buy reassurance. If you have an acute problem right now, an appointment with any good doctor is what you need, not a membership. And if something is dangerous, the NHS emergency system is better than anything private medicine offers in this country, which is why I tell my own members to call 999 or 111 when it matters. I would rather say that plainly than sell a year of care to somebody who does not need one. ## Who this suits It is worth it if you have decided that finding things early is the thing you want to buy, and you are willing to be measured properly before anything is wrong. It suits people carrying family history they would rather not repeat. It suits people whose work makes them unreachable by an eight in the morning phone queue. And it suits parents who want a doctor who knows their children, so that the worst night of the year becomes a twelve-minute conversation rather than four hours in a waiting room. If none of that is you, keep your money. If it is, the value was never in the appointments you use. It is in the year that nothing goes wrong, because somebody was watching. --- ### Dr Ben Ingram Private GP based in Kent. The practice is members-only, built around a comprehensive assessment, a written health strategy, and care managed across the year. It is not an urgent or out-of-hours service. MBBS, BSc, MRCGP · GMC-registered · CQC-registered independent practice · Clinical Director, Sittingbourne PCN · nearly 20 years across NHS and private practice. [← All articles](https://drbeningram.com/articles) [Book an assessment](https://online-booking.semble.io/?token=ff40ba7bcddba56522824a1a84222cdb5f50a2cf)