GP appt saga

I know we are incredibly lucky with our GP surgery (rural area).

I phoned up the other day as DS was unwell. Phoned at 8.30am got straight through to reception and an appointment that morning.

Similar story every time I use GP. I had my coil changed by the female GP in the surgery. Received a letter, phoned up and booked an appointment for a few weeks later. I cannot fault them at all. I assume it’s because it’s a low population area that it can maintain its services.

Yet my in-laws can barely get through on the phone at their surgery, and my friend ended up just going private for a uti as she couldn’t even get through to her GP. People are going to A&E for issues that could’ve been treated by a GP but they can’t get seen. And god knows what’s being missed! And same story, if you actually somehow manage to get an appointment the place is like a ghost town with no patients in the building!

I’ve no idea what the answer is, but whatever they’re doing now is clearly not working for lots and lots of people!

What a smear test by phone!!!!
What did you do go on video and get the spoons out?

Sorry, but COVID can only be used as an excuse for so long imo. This is getting ridiculous.
I've also had experiences where I've needed a GP to LOOK at something, and have been fobbed off with phone appointments only.
There's no way the backlog is going to get whittled down if no ones bloody well being seen!!

I'm with you on this one!

Exactly! All the consulting room doors are open with no one in them whenever I call in to drop off my consultants letters (I get them to sign for them otherwise they deny knowing about my condition), definitely no “emergencies” or anything else happening behind the scenes.

My smear test appointment was changed to a telephone appointment and when I went in (to the almost empty building) I was told that it had to be by telephone and then the nurse would decide whether I should be allowed to book an in person appointment! So I had my telephone appointment and was told that the system would be updated “within two working days” to allow me to telephone to book an in person appointment. I start work at 8 am and can’t make personal calls so had to wait until the next half term break so I could ‘phone at 8am to make an appointment!

The whole thing is a joke.

“The current way of working is clearly not working”

Absolutely agree and with such clear consensus from nearly everybody that the system is broken, it is beyond belief that the many problems haven’t been addressed already. Currently the way GP practices are operating are putting people in danger every single day.

I would have stood in reception and rang on my phone starting them dead eye at the same time. What a joke

I am very much of the opinion that GPs and the NHS in general is being deliberately underfunded so that it can be ‘improved’ by privatisation.

castawave - That is really bad, but I have to say when I had a mole on my arm that I wanted checked, I did the econsult and sent a photo and within 48 hours was offered a face to face appointment. Was referred to the dermatology clinic under the 2 week wait and was seen within that time. It was fortunately a harmless keratosis. This would have been 12-18 months ago.

This thread is pretty shocking. We've had one receptionist on this thread defending her practice, but other than that, no gps or receptionists attempting to give us some insight into what's going on in the background.

If they did, no doubt we would hear how genuinely overworked, overwhelmed and short staffed they are.

And we get that. However. The current way of working is CLEARLY not working. This needs to be looked at urgently.

My experience recently was fighting to get a face to face appointment for a cancerous mole. To be told no need for f2f, telephone consultation good enough. I'll refer you to dermatologist but it will be two years before you'll be seen.

I was shocked no one would visibly inspect it. I went privately. Shudder to think what the consequences would have been if I'd just waited two years as they advised.

There could be patients in treatment rooms waiting for ambulances

There could, but I bet there isn't.

I'm sure all the receptionists will trot out the good old "we are on our knees".

Doing what Christ only knows.

DP has been told he can't renew his prescription for medication (that is literally keeping him alive), until he's had a review. The nearest available appointment is in February...he has enough meds left to last 2 weeks. We're just praying he's at home when the seizures start.

Of course. He had dreadful stomach cramps, wind and I think diarrhoea.
But, he can’t have penicillin so this is the alternative antibiotic.

Kidney failure.

Your dad needs to stop taking the statins until he can talk to a clinician.
If necessary ring 111 and they'll get one to phone him.

Should say don't ask about the blood clinic though
I need bloods every 12 weeks. I take annual leave for the day to get them done
Turned up as they opened and it was already a 2.5hr queue. One person taking bloods
Took my ticket and left and said I would come back apparently not allowed but I went for breakfast----
Every blood clinic is the same, every day and by 8.30am they're closed as too many people waiting

I've changed doctors and have to say my new ones are incredible
Actually being treated properly for hashimotos, had around 25 blood tests as the doctor wanted to see my normal, referred for something that should have been done 8 years ago
Can ring at 9/10am and get a same day appointment. If they don't have any then you can ring again at 6pm and get an evening one. Also weekend appointments

It's like night and day with my previous doctors

The other week I went to the gp reception to fill in a form. I ask the receptionist about a query I put through online the previous week. She couldn't find it and said you'll need to speak to a gp. She said there's a telephone appt on Wednesday (this was Monday). I said that's great and she booked it whilst I was standing there. Come Wednesday I had been waiting all afternoon for a phone call. I was told they would call between 3 -6pm. They didn't call so I called reception. Apparently there was no appt booked in the first place!

My DH had some abnormal blood results. These were recorded on his online records along with “bloods to be retested in eight weeks”. Whoever saw the results couldn’t have read them properly as they had written “normal results, no further action”. My DH spotted the anomaly and called the surgery to highlight this discrepancy. After being 18th in the call queue, the receptionist told him to call back at 8am next day to get an appointment. He tried calling and was in a long queue. Eventually he got through to be told all the appointments had gone and to call next day at 8am.

@MadeOfAllWork can i be cheeky and ask what the antibiotics/statins combined did? My step dad has been really ill since being given strong antibiotics and he's on statins.

This is literally why I got my prescription on 22nd December.

I rang up and said to a very lovely receptionist that I would be stuck for ages if they didn't grant it, and that there were no appointments for medication review.

Our system closed to everything non-urgent for Nov and Dec. The urgent appointments online thing was open from 6am and she told me the urgent appts are gone by 6.30.

she left me on hold while she went and talked to a doctor. I think she probably went at it in a very determined way, but I deliberately called the Friday before Christmas to force a decision that was likely to go my way.

It's sad but as I'm a regular, I knew that was a good strategy. Really lucky we had great receptionists there.

This never dates It's the perfect parody of medical matters (with education a close second at times).

I'm under regular care for two conditions and haven't seen a doctor in person since Jan 2020,

(when I warned about a very odd strain of pneumonia going around....I have lung scarring from previous pneumonia. And I was declared asthmatic for a long time, but no longer....think it was the pneumonia damage).

One of mum's neighbours ended up with a brain tumour being detected late because he couldn't get a face to face during lockdown. It's amazing he's still around; his family didn't think he'd make it. he was in private rehab for months after it was removed.

His case is exactly why my GP friend wanted to see people in person even in lockdown. I wish I could join her surgery.

Of course one of the first systems for this online crap was Babylon, who were advised by, and paid out to, Dominic Cummings.

Face to face appointments won't be coming back for most. It will be video call first.

Mine was held hostage because I needed a medication review before they could give me it, but they didn't have any appointments! 🫣

Doesn't stop them though does it. I had a telephone appointment with the hearing loss clinic a couple of months ago. It went about as well as you'd expect. Utter, utter crap.

Interesting. I hadnt thought of video and phone appointments. I honestly assumed there was only one/no doctor working. I remember when the doctors names would be displayed around the reception area showing which doctors were working that day/which nurses but that has disappeared too. I also can’t get a smear test because they dont have a nurse to do it but they are trying to get one.