To loose my shit at my GP?

Well they probably are because firstly it’s licensed for Erectile dysfunction issues and secondly prescribing it is within the remit of a GP…..afaik they don’t get sent off to a urologist to decide if it’s needed or not.

Now if a bloke had some rare heart issue and needed viagra for that then yes his cardiologist would be expected to prescribe it if it’s not a recognised/licensed drug for that condition.

The battle needs to be getting the nhs to recognise that testosterone should be licensed for menopausal symptoms but if the evidence isn’t there to support it then it won’t happen. I don’t know what evidence there is. If there is some evidence but a reluctance to update national guidelines then that probably needs campaigning on.

They are just asking the specialist to prescribe which isn't unreasonable but does make things more difficult for patients.

I'll tell you why in all the years of their training medical students spend three months on women's health.

Why didn't your consultant do the vaccine and why aren't your cross with them for not doing so?

I'm actually with the GP on this one. There is no reason why the specialist can't prescribe it for you, instead they're just fobbing you off and telling you to get it from your GP instead. A lot of secondary care settings do this and I think it is either laziness or a cost saving measure. I was told by ENT to get these specific ear drops from my GP but my GP physically couldn't prescribe them as the system said the drug is only allowed to be prescribed in a specialist setting. All it meant was me having to go back to the clinic to try and get these drops while my ear was just continuing to go untreated. The GP said they are getting more and more requests from secondary care to prescribe things that they either aren't allowed to prescribe or that they are unfamiliar with, yet are expected to prescribe them when the responsibility lies with the prescriber.

Horrible person
"Losing their shit" at someone is always uneccessary
Especially when that person is working in prescribed guidelines that they can't change.
Even more so when presumably the person is only passing on what they were told by others.

I guess GPs aren't prescribing Viagra then, what with them being generalists and not specialising in men's health.

That's crap OP, I'm sorry. Sometimes consultants can be terrors for batting things back to the GP that is really their own responsibility to oversee, hence the referral in the first place. This is especially true of prescriptions where the whole point of their specialist care is to have them in charge of a particular treatment regimen for a patient, not asking the clinical without their experience to take responsibility for it. I don't know if this is one of those, but it certainly sounds like it could be.

No point getting cross at the GP personally as they did the right thing and sent you to a knowledgeable gynae, yet it's landed back in their lap. I'm.sure the consultant is on their knees too and whacks it back to the GP because they can no longer juggle all these repeat patients in their clinic without their waiting lists getting even longer. Ultimately it's a overstretched system problem. Maybe you could petition your gynae to set up training for the local GPs so they actually have the up-to-date training to manage this!

I don't think anything in the GP's letter indicates that they think that women make up their symptoms. I think what they're expressing is a concern about prescribing off-licence testosterone.

Glow Natural wellness in America do it.

And a whole host of other menopause things.

I have some stuff from them. It takes a couple of weeks to come and obviously it’s not cheap as postage has to be factored in, but if they can do it there must be other places that can.

They can do all your hormones tests too. ones that most of our doctors don’t understand.

It’s no dearer than going private here but easier to get a slot. The appointments going private where I am were fully booked for months in advance.

I did the trio test with them and they did a video consult. I thought they were good.

was your drug off licence though?

Money might come into it. Our gp surgery won’t do blood tests now that any doctor at the hospital has asked for as the gp won’t get paid for it. Which is bonkers. So people,with cancer have to trek to the hospital for their regular blood tests which is the last thing they need.

However the main issue will definitely be the fact the drugs are not licensed. If the gp prescribed it and someone suffered some consequences down the line the gp can’t argue they were prescribing within normal guidelines. The patient could sue and the gp could get in a lot of trouble. A specialist is more able to argue they know better than the guidelines.

I think this is about funding. My GP refused to fill a prescription for hormone treatment for breast cancer after the hospital prescribed the initial dose. The excuse was that they hadn’t received the paperwork. When I attended a clinic appointment the following week and explained, the consultant showed me the email that had been sent direct to the GP when the initial prescription was issued, asking them to provide from that point on. Sometimes the system treats the patient like a ball being batted backwards and forwards as the go between.

This. Due to severely compromised immune system I would be seriously ill if I contracted shingles. My rheumatologist wrote to my GP requesting that they provide the vaccination. Because I was a year under the minimum age, they wouldn’t do it, even though the consultant rang and pointed out that it was for legitimate reasons. They were adamant I wasn’t having it until I asked if I could have it if I paid. £140 later I was vaccinated with no problem. It’s shit, and as a poster upthread pointed out, it’s undoubtedly about money, but I agree, losing your temper and making a scene is likely to get you taken off the GP list.

I bet anything this will be about saving money. The lack of evidence reason will be a smokescreen.

Why aren’t GPs adequately trained in a condition that affects 50% of their patients?! This shouldn’t be a specialist area. It’s absolutely bog standard.

Support women through menopause.

My GP prescribes me testosterone but it was a faff and waste of resources to get here.

I asked GP, he said no. So I asked for referral to gynaecologist. Several weeks later, I had a 2 minute consultation at a hospital with a gynaecologist (on a Sunday, just to increase the cost to the NHS). I said ‘I’d like testosterone’. He said, ‘ok’.

He gave me a prescription. My GP STILL wouldn’t repeat it until the consultant wrote to him to say he recommends I’m prescribed it.

Ridiculous. I am very tempted to make an FOI to ascertain how much this nonsense cost the NHS.

This . Your GP is being professional and responsible. If something goes wrong and they have prescribed something which according to all the textbooks and guidelines is not licensed they could be in trouble and their medical licence is their main consideration. Your gynaecologist should have issued the prescription.

i had off licence drugs prescribed by my nhs consultant for a decade and the GPs would never in a million years prescribed them. My consultant was responsible for all my regular blood tests, etc and monitoring and tweaking of dose.

Is your gynecologist nhs? Can the script go to the hospital pharmacy? Worth a try? Your gynecologist could send a script there msybe

Most GP’s are not specialists in anything hence the their title of general practitioner, and seem to know feck all about menopause in my experience. I’m in Ireland and had to confidently argue my case for testosterone with a very young female GP who knew less than I did. I was told unless my libido was affected and or my marriage was affected as a consequence it was not advisable to prescribe.

I told her my libido was fine but cognitive function was still poor on HRT , she prescribed it I think to make me leave I took up 45 min of her time and read an entire 500 page book the following week , haven’t had the brain power to read in a few years. I know it’s difficult but we need to fight our corner for what we need .

Superdrug can prescribe testosterone privately, they used to have a service.

I too have been fobbed off by the GP with antidepressants, even though I was 45. They refused me HRT and the antidepressants did nothing, because I’m not depressed!
Saw a private GP, got HRT and lo and behold, symptoms massively improved, other than libido issues. Blood test after 3 months showed very low testosterone so private GP happily prescribed it. Guess what, libido returned! But I’ve paid thousands for this and it bloody should be available on the NHS.

You need to have a shared care agreement for any medication that is commenced or prescribed from secondary care with the expectation that your primary healthcare provider will continue to prescribe it. Your gynaecologist clinic should be approached in the first instance and a request to have the testosterone prescribed from them with monitoring until stable. Your GP can then take over the prescribing once you have settled into the dose that is responding to your symptoms. Your GP should also then be able to take on the monitoring of the levels of the drug in your blood with routine blood tests. This is an additional service provided by your primary care GP, and they are within their rights to not immediately take this on if they feel it is outside of their scope of practice.

If the gynaecologist didn't actually give you a prescription then it wasn't prescribed...they simply advised the GP that that is what they'd suggest. Had the consultant issued the first prescription, monitored for effects/side effects and once happy asked the GP to continue then that would be a bit more reasonable, but your post reads like that's not the case. The GP is correct - as the responsibility falls on the actual prescriber, they shouldn't be prescribing if it's outside their usual expertise.

Why is your gynae not the one prescribing it? My dermatologist issues all the prescriptions for my very new biological drugs for eczema… my GP has nothing to do with it and little clue about said meds.