Each full-time GP in Sevenoaks district covers 2,570 patients, against 2,173 in England. No practice has closed its list in four years, the NHS says under FOI.
Each full-time GP in the Sevenoaks district is responsible for about 2,570 registered patients. Across England the figure is about 2,173, so the district’s doctors carry 18 per cent more patients each.
The gap is widest at the smaller Sevenoaks town practices. At South Park Medical Practice, the NHS workforce figures show 1.2 full-time-equivalent GPs for just over 6,000 patients.
The NHS says none of the district’s practices has closed its list to new patients in the past four years. NHS Kent and Medway Integrated Care Board (ICB), which commissions GP services in the county, told Sevenoaks Online so in a response under the Freedom of Information Act on 30 September. Its answer on practice mergers does not match what one Swanley practice says about itself (see below).
Patients per GP, practice by practice
The ICB said it does not hold list sizes, GP numbers or appointment data itself, and pointed to NHS England’s national publications. We took the figures from those.
There are nine GP practices with a main surgery in the district. The table sets each one’s registered patients against its fully qualified GPs, counted as full-time equivalents. GPs in training are left out, as NHS England does in its own headline measure.
| Practice | Patients, 1 Sep 2026 | GPs (FTE), 31 Aug 2026 | Patients per GP |
|---|---|---|---|
| South Park Medical Practice, Sevenoaks | 6,007 | 1.2 | 4,897 |
| St John’s Medical Practice, Sevenoaks | 8,151 | 2.4 | 3,384 |
| River Darent Medical Group | 12,293 | 3.7 | 3,320 |
| Swanley Medical Practice | 24,939 | 8.2 | 3,043 |
| Town Medical Centre, Sevenoaks | 7,047 | 2.4 | 2,937 |
| Edenbridge Medical Practice | 13,516 | 5.1 | 2,671 |
| Amherst Medical Practice, Sevenoaks | 15,068 | 7.6 | 1,994 |
| Otford Medical Practice | 11,746 | 6.0 | 1,953 |
| Westerham Practice | 8,411 | 5.2 | 1,633 |
| All nine practices | 107,178 | 41.7 | 2,570 |
| England | 63,119,653 | 29,042 | 2,173 |
Patients per GP is not the whole story. Practices also employ nurses, pharmacists, paramedics and other clinicians who see patients. Swanley Medical Practice, for example, records about 12 full-time-equivalent staff in those direct patient care roles on top of its GPs and nurses. The measure also counts GP time on the practice’s own books, not doctors working through the local primary care network.
The district has improved since 2023. Counting the same practices, including two that have since merged (below), there were about 2,775 patients per GP in August 2023. GP numbers have risen by 3.4 full-time equivalents since then, while the patient total has barely moved. England improved over the same period too, from about 2,322 to 2,173, so the gap has not closed.
How quickly patients are seen
NHS England also publishes how long each appointment was booked in advance. Over June, July and August 2026 the nine practices recorded about 169,300 appointments:
- 47 per cent were on the day they were booked, against 45 per cent across England
- 84 per cent were within two weeks, against 82 per cent across England and 78 per cent across Kent and Medway
- for appointments with a GP rather than another clinician, 57 per cent were on the same day, close to the England figure of 56 per cent
The spread between practices is wide:
| Practice | Seen the same day | Seen within two weeks |
|---|---|---|
| Edenbridge | 79% | 91% |
| Otford | 59% | 83% |
| Town Medical Centre | 49% | 87% |
| St John’s | 45% | 92% |
| Amherst | 43% | 92% |
| Westerham | 35% | 75% |
| River Darent | 33% | 74% |
| South Park | 33% | 65% |
| Swanley | 22% | 85% |
These are the time between booking and appointment, not a waiting list. A flu jab or a medication review booked a month ahead counts as a long wait even when the patient chose the date. Practices also record appointments differently: the number logged per patient varies more than fourfold between the nine, which says as much about recording as about access. Treat the table as a guide, not a league table.
The merger the ICB did not count
We asked the ICB how many practices in the district had closed their lists, merged, handed back their contracts or closed for good in each year since April 2023. It said none had done any of those things, in any of the four years.
Swanley Medical Practice tells a different story on its own website. It says: “The Cedars Surgery merged with The Oaks Partnership on 13 November 2023 and became Swanley Medical Practice.” It adds that The Cedars had been responsible for The Oaks practice since 1 April 2023. Both dates fall in the 2023/24 year covered by our request.
The NHS figures bear that out. The Oaks Partnership in Nightingale Way had 10,584 registered patients in September 2023 and none a year later. Over the same year Swanley Medical Practice’s list rose from 13,700 to 24,790. NHS organisation records show The Oaks as inactive from 28 February 2025. The practice now runs from three sites: the Cedars in Swanley Centre, the Oaks in Nightingale Way, and Hextable.
River Darent Medical Group’s list also more than doubled that year, from 5,707 to 12,670. In the same period Devon Road Surgery in South Darenth, just over the border in Dartford borough, dropped off the register. NHS organisation records show Devon Road closed on 30 April 2025. Because Devon Road sat outside the district, it would not have been in scope for our question.
We have asked the ICB how it recorded the Swanley change and whether its answer should be corrected. We will update this report with its reply.
The ICB also said it holds no record of any district practice being in a formal support or improvement process.
What it means for you
- You can apply to register with any practice whose boundary covers your address. The ICB says no district practice has formally closed its list since at least April 2023. Find practices near you with the NHS find a GP service.
- Check your own practice. Every practice’s patient numbers and staffing are in the NHS England files linked below, and its inspection rating is on the Care Quality Commission website.
- If you cannot get through, NHS 111 covers urgent problems that are not emergencies, online or by phone.
Some residents on the edges of the district may be registered at practices just outside it. Borough Green Medical Practice, for example, sits in Tonbridge and Malling but belongs to the Sevenoaks primary care network. Those practices are not in these figures.
This is the second in our series of reports built on Freedom of Information requests. The first found that fly-tipping reports in the district rose 58 per cent in two years. For crime in the town, see the latest Sevenoaks crime figures.
Sources
- NHS Kent and Medway Integrated Care Board, response to Freedom of Information request FOI.26.KAM343, 30 September 2026 (obtained under FOI)
- NHS England, Patients Registered at a GP Practice, September 2026 (and the September 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025 editions for the comparisons)
- NHS England, General Practice Workforce, 31 August 2026 (practice-level high-level CSV; 31 August 2023 edition for the comparison)
- NHS England, Appointments in General Practice, August 2026 (practice-level crosstab, June to August 2026)
- Swanley Medical Practice, practice website (merger notice)
- NHS Organisation Data Service, The Oaks Partnership (G82225) and Devon Road Surgery (G82088)
The nine practices are those whose main surgery postcode lies in Sevenoaks district. England figures sum every practice in the same practice-level files, so they differ slightly from NHS England’s national headline. Workforce figures are at 31 August and patient lists at 1 September 2026. Chart by Sevenoaks Online.
Image: Swanley shopping centre by Chris Gunns, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Geograph and Wikimedia Commons.
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