To think that there is little common sense any more, and o wonder why this is?

[jimijack]

Friend 1, her 12 year old had d&v, perfectly healthy boy, d&v for 30 minutes after school. Phoned GP, couldn't get an appointment, so called 111. Told to look after him at home, given advice about how to do it.

Friend 2, husband, had a cold, day 3, not taken anything for it, again, perfectly fit and well, calling gp for an appointment. Then 111.
Both disgusted that they could not be seen .

I have had this conversation quite alot with family/friends/colleagues.
May well be that I am a hard faced cowbag who never bothers any one with what I consider to be minor stuff, easily cared for at home, but is it just me that is gobsmacked by this culture of "ring the gp for sniffles"?
Why has it come to this do you think?

[Nowwatchmewhip]

I totally agree with you

[ISaySteadyOn]

For friend 1, as it was her DS, it may be due to school's absence policy- there was thread on this the other day. Doesn't stop your point being true, just directs it at school.

Friend 2, wtf?

I agree with you OP. Also, I think dragging your ill self to the gp does more harm than good to you and other patients.

[FeliciaJollygoodfellow]

Because people have a attitude that makes them feel that anything they don't like should be fixed by someone else. Even if it's not possible. Even if it's something that shouldn't be challenged or changed.

I have a friend like this. Insists she has flu when it's clearly a cold, can't get a doctors appointment so rocks up the walk in and complains she has to wait!

[Witchend]

I met a lad like the above in A&E once. He was about 14/15 and was so embarrassed poor lad. he said his dm took him to A&E every time he threw up once. I assumed he must have an underlying health issue, but chatting to his dm, apparently not.

[YoungGirlGrowingOld]

I totally agree. I feel like asking people what on earth they expect the GP to do? What advice is there for a common, self-limiting illness other than keep warm, drink fluids and take paracetamol?

Being a GP would drive me potty, but I also think the level of stupidity and ignorance displayed by some patients must make them pretty jaded and perhaps less likely to be on the ball when patients do present with worrying symptoms. It can be quite difficult to convince my GP that i have already done all the usual/sensible stuff, because her standard response is " take paracetamol and come back in 2 weeks"...

[ZoeTurtle]

YABU with your thread title. There's as much common sense as there ever was, though people often choose not to exercise it through (usually unfounded) claims of H&S breaches or the threat of being sued.

YANBU about people going to the doctor with minor ailments. The NHS are trying to educate - I see ads all over the place advising self-care - but they have to be careful not to put people off who have genuine complaints. You have to remember there are plenty of people who are the opposite to the ones you're moaning about, and won't "bother" the GP with anything but imminent death.

[GashleyCrumbTiny]

Numpties like this are one of the reasons the NHS is in so much trouble. Them and the Tories are in it together.

[hiddenhome2]

Absolutely. People seem to be incapable of home nursing now

I have relatives in the care home demanding a GP visit for their parents for perfectly routine things that us nurses can easily deal with

They get very stroppy if you don't do as they ask, phone the GP themselves then the nurses get short shrift from that GP.

Have you seen the movie 'Idiocracy'? This is what's happening to us

[Gottagetmoving]

Agree with you OP.
There is no need to see a doctor if you have a cold, or an episode of D&V
People just waste the doctor's time. If they DO see the doctor they want 'something' for their cold.
It now affects A&E - people turn up there with coughs FFS! or small cuts.

I think lots of people panic where their children are concerned and want the doctor to 'fix' them instead of realising a virus just has to take it's course.

[amarmai]

maybe school and work require dr's notes? The very last day before my retirement from teaching was a clean up day , no children in school. I was having heart palpitations and informed my head of dept of that and said i wd be going to the dr and not coming in to empty the portable of books etc. I was told by the office to forward a dr's note!

[YoungGirlGrowingOld]

Amar I hope you told them to bugger off not to be so ridiculous!

I don't think getting a doctor's note is a waste of an appointment - most sensible places allow self-cert for at least a few days. I do think we have all become rather infantilised when it comes to medical things though. Do people just want someone to make sympathetic noises or do they really think that GP's have a magic cure for all normal childhood common or garden illness? It baffles me.

I always think our GP reception is the most germy unhygienic place in the world! I would much rather drink cuppas and watch Lorraine in bed until I feel better - unless I am really at death'so door!

[Kennington]

There is a culture of entitlement .
A lack of knowledge that people are wasting doctors time.
We all suffer as a result, as we will have to pay more and when we book, very soon for this service.
It also wastes time delaying treatment for the genuinely ill.

[BeanGirls]

The school might require a note or maybe she was worried.

The dh might have other health issues, they might not want to tell you about.

[LittleFeileFooFoo]

I think the paracetamol companies have a lot to answer for on this issue. They promise massive fixes worn a little pill, why wouldn't people want that result? Its natural to want to expend little energy for a big gain. It may not be realistic, but that's what the ads promise. ..

[LittleFeileFooFoo]

pharmaceutical not paracetamol

[PacificDogwod]

I despair at the apparent loss of common sense and…. I dunno, resilience? in the face of very everyday minor adversity.

So, YANBU IMO.

I think we live in an 'anxious' society in which the expectation is that 'something needs to be done' and in which there is very little tolerance for feeling unwell or needing to accept that things don't always go they way we would like.

[TheHiphopopotamus]

Numpties like this are one of the reasons the NHS is in so much trouble

This. I have a paramedic friend who is thinking of leaving their job because of having to deal with ridiculous shit like this.

Although, on the other hand, I also know a nurse who is worse than anybody else I know for taking her kids to the doctors for antibiotics as soon as her DC sneeze

[YoungGirlGrowingOld]

HipHop Like your paramedic friend, DH also used to get the most ridiculous requests when he was on call even from patients who were genuinely sick. (Like the man on chemo who shagged his ex after getting pissed, who then (hysterically) demanded to know if her hair would fall out. At 3am.)

I agree with the PP up thread who said it was like Idiocracy. We are all making the (wrong) assumption that healthcare is and will always be free and therefore it has no value and we should help ourselves to it whenever and however often we fancy, no matter how pointless or trivial our complaint. It really boils my piss (as you can tell!)

Another paramedic/first responder friend got a call out for a man who reported being unable to breathe - when she got there, he had nasal congestion caused by the common cold. It hadn't occurred to him to use steam or take decongestants the nob head So ridiculous it's funny, but while this man was "not breathing", you gran or granddad would be lying on the floor waiting for a non-urgent ambulance for their painful broken hip. People can be selfish arseholes.

[CesareBorgiasUnicornMask]

I'm usually absolutely of your opinion OP, and think DH is a monstrous drama llama, always running off to the GP for nothing.

Feeling slightly guilty now as he's currently in hospital awaiting an emergency appendectomy after I told him to buck up and go to work this morning as it was only tummy ache . although I did change my mind and took him to A&E when he arrived home grey two hours later

I am clearly a horrible, unsympathetic wife not to mention a pretty crap medical student .

[PacificDogwod]

Cesare, but that's the thing: many more serious conditions take time to declare themselves. Your DH's abdominal discomfort could have gone away. Or it could have got worse - which it did and he/you did the right thing.
If he had rocked up at A+E half an hour in to ''sore tummy" he may have been sent packing.

at 'not breathing'.
I've had a long and drawn out conversation with somebody who was 'not breathing' and did not understand me saying they clearly were as they were capable of arguing their side of the story quite loudly. They too had a bunged up nose.

To be fair, the stories HCP remember are the ludicrous ones: the total and utter overreactions and bizarre reasoning, OR (the flip side of that) people who are desperately ill who do not call anybody out because they a. are in denial, or b. don't want to 'be a bother' or c. hope it'll go away. All the thousands of people I've dealt with other the years who've used the service totally appropriately, I don't really remember. And they don't make for exasperated anecdotes either.

But yes, generally, there seems to be a trend towards more unthinking knee-jerk 999 dialling
Like the chap who called a 999 ambulance at 3am one Sunday morning to take him to A+E with the sprained thumb he'd hurt some 2 weeks ago and which was still sore. When given a hard time about this he said "I thought you'd not be so busy at this time". This was a number of years ago, before paramedics had the right to turn people down if a trip to hospital was not necessary or appropriate.

[ClashCityRocker]

Reminds me of brothers latest rant - ' nhs is fuckin useless, by the time I got to see a doctor, it had cleared up all by itself!'

The flip side is, of course, people like my mum, who had to be hospitalised with pneumonia which could have been treated much earlier but she didn't want to be one of 'those' people.

[Scoobydoo8]

People believe they are paying for NHS etc so it should be there at their beck and call.

Charging a fiver for a gps appt would probably put a stop to this but we would bleat too much about that so it doesn't happen.

Giving people stuff which they don't have to work for doesn't bring out the best in them.

[vintagesewingmachine]

I totally agree. The number of normally fit people I see who have been coughing for a few days beggars belief. The same goes for parents who trot in with their very bouncy and bright eyed toddler who has vomited a couple of times just to get him " checked out".

[Moln]

How utterly ridiculous.

I can tell you that having to pay your GP around £50 cash each visit, and the equivilant of £85 to go to A&E stops this. Least that's the fees here and I've never know anyone who has to pay behave like that.