My family practice was the only one in our part of Norfolk that throughout was in favour of the National Health Service and voted for it whenever the doctors’ opinion was asked.

The NHS started with immense goodwill and initially provided a service, including that in general practice, that was the envy of the world.

Our care for patients was second to none, even if at the time the advances in the treatment of heart, renal, respiratory failure, or even many of the infectious diseases, including TB, hadn’t come on stream.

The atmosphere and morale in hospital and general practice was high. The research work carried out in our universities and pharmaceutical laboratories led the world. Only last week a colleague listed the number of instances in which initial research done in Britain had led the way to major international clinical advances in medical practice.

Even so, nearly 30 years ago when talking to a joint Anglo-American medical meeting in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, one of the US medical centres of excellence, I was forced to admit that the NHS was beginning to break down. The difference in outcome for patients in the North and South was frightening, general practice that had been of a high standard throughout the country was now beginning to crumble in less affluent areas.

After my talk I was kindly, but firmly, rebuked by the medical knight leading our delegation. Now it would be accepted by nearly everyone in medicine. Regional variations in quality of service and postcode lottery are still with us. General practice is far from the satisfying and exciting, if all-absorbing and time consuming, life that it was when the NHS began and even when I joined it. This is despite the power that every doctor now has to treat patients effectively and in a way that was undreamt of at the start of the NHS. Hospital practice is in an uproar, and morale is rock bottom.

What has gone wrong? The Times is anxious to hear from those working at the coal face, as Aneurin Bevan would have understood it, of the NHS. By e-mailing me at The Times anonymity is assured and the public will learn the truth.

Do you work in the NHS?

If so, Dr Stuttaford would like to hear from you. What is your experience of the NHS? What has changed since you entered it? What is the single most serious problem affecting healthcare today and what three things would make it better ? Anonymity guaranteed.

Please e-mail Dr Stuttaford at doctors@thetimes.co.uk, or you can write to him at: Dr Stuttaford, times2, The Times, 1 Pennington Street, London E98 1TT.