Today for the first time ever, I had to call NHS 111; and would just like to say how surprised, impressed and grateful I am with the excellent service.
It;s Saturday, woke up to painful recurrence of old problem. I ring GP. closed for weekend. Ring local pharmacy who have a good out of hours treatment service for UTI but it's restricted to under 65s; I'm too old. She says " You'll need a doctors prescription. Ring 111 and ask them for one."
111 keeps me hanging on the line for 15 minutes . Every five minutes a recording says " We know you've been waiting 5/10/15 minutes, but don't hang up." Then someone picks up and from then on, it's all plain sailing; kind and efficient call handler takes my ID details and symptoms asks questions then says " Hold the line for a few minutes; I'm going to do some record checking, don't go away. If we get cut off, I'll ring you back at home." A few minutes later she comes back and says " I'm going to take you into a consult with a nurse; I'll be there and you'll hear me passing on your symptoms. " On a 3-way call, I meet the nurse who asks further questions and says "Right, you do need treatment right away with antibiotics, but they have to be prescribed by a Dr . I'm going to arrange that. An out-of-hours Dr will call you at home . Call us back if there are any problems." They both wish me well., end of call.
An hour later I get a call from the local hospital. Its an out of hours Dr, who asks a few questions then says she will prescribe as requested and medication will be waiting at reception in 5 minutes.. By then I'm staying close to loo. DH drives 5 miles to hospital and its waiting with my name on.
Under 3 hours from first call to starting treatment. Pretty good!
Please or to access all these features
Please
or
to access all these features
Mumsnet doesn't verify the qualifications of users. If you have medical concerns, please consult a healthcare professional.
Covid
NHS 111 has a happy customer.
4 replies
2bazookas · 31/10/2020 14:08
OP posts:
Please create an account
To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.