I upset a lady at GP surgery today

I often collect medication that has a change in supplier/packaging but this would have absolutely thrown my mum (even distressed) in her dementia years. Fortunately she had those weekly packaged pop out pills delivered so would only know if the actual pill shape, size or colour had changed. I know this isn’t the point but just illustrating why someone with a cognitive problem needs tolerance to be shown. It was absolutely the receptionist’s problem to deal with and she should have had the nouse to be able to do this. Advise practice manager that some relevant training is required?

I would have done that after 2 minutes you where good waiting that long ! If the old lady had difficulty understanding what was happening maybe she need extra care and someone with her

Receptionist should have shut her down. Theyre normally quite good at being rude and unhelpful!!!

Yes by the lady can't get to the GP without going through the receptionist! She doesn't have their personal mobile. She needs the receptionist to get her someone that can help/speak to the Dr

Oh I follow you.
That don’t me I’m stalking you lol but I understand what you mean.

YADNBU
It boils down to the lady lacking any sense of awareness or complete selfishness to disregard the queue behind her. There are a lot of people like this.

Having said that, the receptionist needs to up her game and do her job properly in respect of moving her along appropriately.

I can't believe there are still surgeries in existence in the UK that don't have screens you check in yourself?!? There's always people waiting to speak to the Receptionists in my GP surgery, dear God, if you had to wait behind the weird and wonderful queries, you may as well bring a tent and flask with you...Next time you get the annual 'what's your GP like' survey, tell them to get with the early 2010's when most surgeries introduced touchscreens... EDIT: I've just seen a following post where it says your GP does have but it was broken!

if you throw in an irrelevant description showing us someone's in a group routinely dismissed and disrespected, you're inviting people who share that prejudice to come and pile on. It isn't always deliberate of course, but that's what happens.

You can see it in this thread - lots of people deciding the woman in question was clueless and didn't understand generic medicine, when we have no grounds to think that was even the problem. People comparing her to other older women they dislike. You'd get a more balanced view if you didn't encourage people to pool their presumptions and prejudices like this.

Black, disabled, fat, thin-all just descriptions.

Especially when OP is 70 (and prone to exaggerating) 🤣

But the lady needed to speak to a GP not a receptionist!
The fault was with the receptionist though. She should have put the lady on the sit and wait list for the GP and then worked through the queue

What difference does it make as if she had said young woman no one would have even mentioned it.
Young, old it’s just a description.

I thought it was it had already been going on for ten minutes when op joined the queue and she said something at the 25 minute mark.
I was counting this as 25 minutes in total including the 10 she wasn’t there for.
When she downgraded it to 10 minutes, I saw that as 10 minutes prior to her joining the queue plus the 10 minutes prior making 20 minutes.
Although to be fair I’m getting my eyes crossed as well with the number of minutes so you could be right.

@TheQuirkyMakersaid “To be fair, maybe it was 10 minutes total”

And stop using “old” as an identifier.

Didn't she change 25 minutes to ten minutes?

But the receptionist in your case in person in mine on the phone is the gatekeeper. I had to go through the problem over and over again and the possible outcomes (her causing a Potentially fatal accident) because she kept saying it's Friday afternoon so can't do anything till Monday. Do you think i should have just said ok? How about if it was one of your loved ones driving past when she caused a pile up?

You have no idea of the implications of the med changes and if it was a planned change or a mistake.

Being rude to someone who is clearly worried about something important to them is unnecessary. You could have politely said sorry to interrupt but could I just check in so I don't miss my appointment.

Couldn't be arsed reading through 17 pages of drivel

Yes 10 minutes instead of 15 making a total of 20 minutes not 25 as the old woman had already been going in a waste of time loop for 10 mins.

The OP has already said she was mistaken about the time.

This is a blatant lie. There's no way she was there 25 minutes 😂😂😂

What would you suggest she do? If her medications have genuinely been changed, important meds deprescribed or missing without her knowledge do you expect her to just suck it up rather than inconvenience you?

She can't exactly march in and speak to a Gp, she has to go through reception. If she has something like Parkinsons then the brand is important and may cause significant flare ups if changed.

Your solution was for her to suck it up rather than the Gp just open a second window! Your whole argument is based on the fact your assuming this woman was being stupid and won't suffer any affects from her possible medication change

My daughter got stuck in a queue to check in at our GP's as the machine was broken. She was waiting for so long that she missed the appointment time and the receptionist told her she had to make another appointment! So I think you were definitely right to intervene.

Sounds good 😃
I'm sure DH would be glad of the respite from being chatted at.

Well, quite - but then where would the drama have been? And the opportunity to give an ageist dig? And judging by the tenor of the OP’s posts, just to be, well, a little bit unpleasant given the opportunity?

Don’t worry, @LaMarschallin-I’ll live with you. We can devote our lives to promoting consistency and credibility. I like cats and red wine. I hope we’re compatible!