Being vile to 111

I know this is an old post but I just had to comment.
Speaking from experience, 111 is a sign posting service. Except on very rare occasions the call handler does not have any medical training and can not diagnose. The poor call handler is just trying to do a job!

I’ve had 111 be arsey with me when I didn’t know an answer for certain about my daughter 🤷🏼‍♀️

If you have tonsillitis, a fever of 40c after already having one course of antibiotics, and are immuno suppressed, you absolutely do need 111 if you can’t access your GP.

You can get antibiotics prescribed at a pharmacy for things like tonsillitis, it’s a service called pharmacy plus. No need for 111.

my partner worked there for a while, he didn’t love it but I don’t remember him being massively upset by it. It did allow him to get a better job in private healthcare though, maybe that’s something to look into OP?

@Redglitter I think a lot of the time though the call handlers need to realise they're talking to poorly people who are stressed and they need to act a bit more human instead of just going through a questionnaire

It might be but that's no reason to be rude to call handlers

In general I think 111 is pretty useless.

They just send people to their GP or to A&E.

Twice 111 have told me to contact my GP and twice the GP has been horrible in response and said there was no point me having an appointment

It's not right for anyone to be horrible full stop.

But as to reasons why - sometimes the service can be quite dangerous. I have experience of a serious paracetamol overdose and the 111 person saying a GP would phone the next day!

I also have a medication that I accidentally ran out of and 111 did not understand that a pharmacy couldn't just supply it as it was a controlled drug.

As a call handler, you can of course think whatever you like is a 'good result'. However, as shown here, actual patients disagree with you. Your attitude goes a long way to answering the OP's original question on why callers to 111 are 'awful'.

Sorry, did I just read that right? 'A 14-hour turnaround is pretty good for a Saturday'.
Wow, if a 14-hr wait is considered 'pretty good', the system really IS fucked!

that sounds so frightening you must have been terrified 💐

I went to A and E on 2016 with symptoms of meningitis.. they checked me in but I didn't even make it to a chair in waiting room before a nurse came and took me through.. someone then yelled " that fcking bitch only just fcking well got here I've been waiting hours" weirdly except for a nurse putting me in a darkened side room and saying "we understand about the headache " that was the last thing I remembered for over 24 hours .. she must have riled me quite a bit

I used 111 online this week - A nurse called me back within 10 minutes.
Another time I used it I was recommended to see a pharmacist. My local pharmacy rang me and had a prescription ready within 30 minutes.

I would highly recommend using their online form where possible.

I wasn’t going to reply anymore but I had a notification of a thanks (again!) to one of my posts on this thread.

I am not a troll and I am a call handler on 111.

14 hours is a good turnaround, 111 in different regions deal with thousands of calls a day. It’s not perfect but the service is over subscribed due to the NHS being overwhelmed. Also I do find some people wait until out of hours is open these days rather than try their GP. I can understand that, but yeah, more pressure on 111.

If you’d got me you’d have been assessed with sore throat as your main symptom and if you had said something like you were immuno suppressed on the call I would have got clinical advice before putting you on the call back queue.

If you’d mentioned the anti biotic course you had already taken and a fever of 40c I would (and I hope the call handler who took your call did) would have put that in the notes.

The call queues are reviewed by clinicians through the day who then call you back for a further assessment of your symptoms or decide to send your call straight over to the out of hours team. So no I don’t make decisions about people’s health care it’s not my place to.

If you had called your GP at 8am and they offered you a 6pm appointment same day would you complain it took 10 hours to get an appointment?

Anyway this is my last post on this topic @SummerAndSunPlease I am just trying to explain how things work and why I think 14 hours was a good result.

It’s a different world now and for many reasons the services are overloaded. I don’t think GP services will change now - the present system seems to be the way forward since Covid.

This is exactly what people are finding frustrating.

I get your job is not easy. But when someone explains to You why it is frustrating you can take it on board and sympathise or you can ignore them and be sarcastic. An “I know” goes a long way.

the system doesn’t always work, that’s a fact. I was told to go to a specific pharmacy for antibiotics for something. The pharmacy didn’t offer that service. In fact the antibiotics I needed couldn’t be prescribed by a pharmacist.

if a service is poor “you are lucky to get anything in the first place” isn’t the right answer. It won’t make it work better.

The 111 service is broken, why can't we go back to the days of the family doctor having an on call system. Years ago my mum had a massive haemorrhage after a gynaecological operation, I rang our doctors at 9.30pm & had a doctor come out to see her within 15 minutes, she was on her way back to the hospital within an hour where the surgeon who had done her operation was waiting to take her back to theatre. Ds regularly has to ring 111 for his dad, who is severely disabled with MS, he can be waiting anything up to 4 hours to speak to a doctor & then waiting anything up to 12 hours for an ambulance, several times this has been for sepsis.

While the frustration of navigating healthcare systems, particularly in times of distress, is legitimate, it is important to place this frustration in the context of the broader public health system. The NHS 111 service exists to perform a vital function in managing and triaging healthcare needs across the population. Criticism of the system should be balanced with an understanding of the complex processes it must follow to ensure patient safety and resource efficiency.

Moreover, verbal abuse directed at frontline healthcare workers is never justified. Healthcare workers operate within the constraints of their role, and their purpose is to assist, not to provide immediate solutions to every caller’s issue.

For these reasons, rather than directing anger at NHS 111, it is more productive to channel energy into advocating for systemic improvements within the healthcare framework, ensuring better resourcing and more streamlined processes for all patients.

not that it makes it right and its only some people but people wonder why govts dont give a hoot at times when the general public behaves the way they do

I think people have every right to feel frustrated. Just with the whole system, generally.

I phoned for my Dh and I found them slow, irritating and dismissive. Having already seen a pharmacist, spoken to 2 x GP's and gone to 2 x walk in centres, as told to do. We got nothing out of it. In the end I took him to A&E and I'm glad I did, he was omitted to a ward for 3 days.

When someone is in pain, we want quick help to ease the pain. When you think about it, that's is a basic need and want that should be fulfilled. You'd struggle to persuade me otherwise.

I worked for 111 a few years back for a few years , we wasn't at that time trained in how to deal with stressed patients because we were trained to understand that most people calling 111 will be worried , in pain , scared or looking for alternative help ... finding a dentist was hugely popular back then.
Yes people can be horrible but when you think of why they're calling you can't take it personally.
I worked in retail since and I find people are far ruder because they can't find an out of stock item!
It may be frustrating for you op I get that but the people calling are In a far worse position I'm in sure , I'm not saying abuse is ok to take from a caller either by the way

They have to ask though because believe me people don't mention it
Think calling for a finger injury and missing out the fact the patient was gored by a bull in the chest
Or cut leg, omitting the fact the leg was trapped in farm machinery and no longer attached to the patient
Or going through the patients entire medical history from 1950 onwards and ending with "right now? Oh he isn't breathing"

@Thekormachameleon Yes, in which case I'd be going to A&E, not waiting around on 111. My point was that there should be a simpler system for things like minor injuries, straightforward infections etc that aren't life threatening but still debilitating, rather than everyone clogging up the one call centre-style system regardless of seriousness.

It’s because a very large number of people are completely incapable of expressing themselves without aggression and can’t handle even a modicum of stress without totally losing it. Resilience has to be at an all time low.

”Stress” is not an excuse for acting like an arsehole or a get out of jail free card.

Anyone I’ve spoken to on 111 has been perfectly helpful, and even if they weren’t, I wouldn’t verbally abuse them. I’d raise a complaint in a reasonable fashion.

@Doingsgirl The fact you keep banging on about "sore throat" shows your lack of medical training and illustrates why people view (some) call handlers as an obstruction to getting medical help (and therefore get angry). Your whole attitude stinks. I hope you're trolling and are not really a call handler making decisions about people's healthcare.