Ds1 (6) has had a minor sore throat for a few days but yesterday had woken up crying in pain, couldn't swallow, yawn or talk. I had a look and his tonsils were huge, felt his glands in his neck and they were like hard round marbles and he went 'ow' when I touched them. Felt a bit warm but no actual temperature at that point. So I managed to get a morning appointment in open surgery time and took him to see GP.
We waited over an hour for an appointment, in which time I could feel and see ds's temperature going up. He was tired and a bit lethargic and you could feel the heat radiating off him. So I stripped his top off and put him next to the window.
Anyway...in we went. The GP didn't look at ds at all when we entered, just maintained eye contact with me and asked his symptoms, then picked up the thing (light...magnifier?) and looked in ds's ears and throat. It's hard to explain how 'off' this seemed in words, but IMO you can tell quite a bit from how a child looks, so it seemed very odd that she didn't even look at him, let alone ask him anything.
So, she pronounced his throat red and ears fine. She then ran her hands lightly over his neck and said 'glands are normal' and took his temperature (in the ear) and declared it 36.8 and fine. Then asked me what treatment i was hoping for from then on 
.
At this point I could feel the warmth still radiating from ds so asked if she could test his temperature again. She gave me an indulgent smile and did...looked surprised and a bit shamefaced and went 'Oh it's actually 39! Sorry!'
I asked her about his glands and said to me they seemed very pronounced and painful. She felt them again a bit more firmly, ds1 visibly winced but she again said they were completely normal.
She then said that she understood I was probably hoping for antibiotics, but...and gave me a two minute lecture about the differences between viral and bacterial. I tried to politely interrupt (I'm not an idiot, I know the difference and had given no indication I was 'looking for' anti b's) but she was on a roll with her speech so on she went.
She then turned to her computer and brought up google, saying she would check if antibiotics were needed. She googled 'fever pain score', clicked on the first result and filled in a form. She said to me 'You can actually do this from home, to see if anti b's are necessary but obviously I don't mind completing it for you'. Well gee, thanks
She turned to ds (and just to point out, this was the first time in over 5 minutes in the room that she had looked ds in the face or spoken to him) and asked him 'So, would you say your throat pain is moderate or severe?'. Ds is a bright 6 year old but fgs, he's 6. He stared at her, obviously not understanding so she repeated it to him word for word. So I answered that it had seemed severe.
Anyway, this form came up with the result that antib's were recommended. So she completed a prescription after poring through some text book for a full two minutes to check dosage. And out we went.
It all just seemed so wrong. Other than the moderate/severe question, she didn't actually look at ds or speak to him/question him at ALL. I'm not a Doctor, but considering the painful marbles that are protruding from ds1's neck, I'm pretty certain they wouldn't be described as 'normal'. Plus add in the temperature mistake, and google telling her whether to prescribe or not.
I said to dh I feel like complaining. I know that Doctors are probably sick of people traipsing in kids with a sniffle at the moment, but ds clearly had more than that and I don't feel that she really examined or diagnosed him at all.
Dh thinks I'm overreacting. He is of the 'Aw come on, she's probably newly qualified or having a bad day' opinion...tbh I couldn't give a fuck and neither of those warrant not doing your job properly IMO.
AIBU?
MNHQ have commented on this thread
AIBU?
To complain about this GP? Long, don't want to drip feed.
OriginalGreenGiant · 12/12/2014 15:31
Well it's always good to get tonsils checked out if it's severely painful and swollen. I say this because I actually ignored a sore throat a few years ago and after a week it developed into a very serious case of quinsy. I was hospitalised for a week after being rushed into a&e uncontrollably vomiting, couldn't even open my mouth enough to let someone look inside it was that painful. Had to have my tonsils drained 
, worst pain I've ever felt aside from labour.
You know your own child, you know when they're seriously ill and your sons throat sounds pretty serious to me. The doctor sounds fairly incompetent, not being able to take a temperature correctly for starters- even I can do that and I'm not medically trained. I'd request another appointment with a different GP, get a second opinion. You never can be too careful... Hope he feels better soon, throat pain is the worst. 
What do you hope to achieve by complaining?
Tell her off? Make her feel bad? "Make sure it never happens to anyone else ever again"?
Will it make you feel vindicated? Better? Will you be happy that you've made some poor overworked GP feel rotten??
FWIW, I am a GP, at the moment, we are seeing upwards of 100 "emergencies" a day. The HUGE majority of these are coughs, colds and sore throats. It has actually become scarily staggering that no one seems able to manage minor illnesses anymore. The "just want to check it", "cant be too careful" has become commonplace. I wonder how we ever managed before and that all these people weren't all admitted desperately ill.
Perhaps you were the 20th sore throat that had insisted they had to be seen that day, perhaps she had just had enough. Perhaps she was tired of arguing with every single patients about wants vs needs. Perhaps she was tired of hearing on the news that all GP's are clearly to blame for the world wide antiobiotic resistance. Who knows, but I can tell you what, it aint gonna get no better. NHS GP is at breaking point.
Wow macdoodle there's a lot of unnecessary venom in your post
I wouldn't complain with the intention of 'making some poor GP feel awful'. But if a medical professional seems to be incompetent, then yes, i do think the patient needs to mention something. Yes, I get they're overworked etc but I still expect an adequate examination of my child.
I've seen two other GPs at the same surgery in the past, both brilliant, and I couldn't find a bad word to say about either. I'm not a precious silly pfb mummy that takes their child in with a cold, and I'm not a complainer by nature.
So you think it was a completely acceptable experience then? I should overlook an incorrect temperature, not being able to identify swollen glands, and the GP not looking at or speaking to her patient among the rest?
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