Was this receptionist wrong?

[AintNobodyHereButUsChickens]

At the back end of last year I had an Xray and a blood test, I phoned up my GP surgery a week or so later to see if the results were back yet and the receptionist told me the results and diagnosis straightaway over the phone.

A couple of weeks ago I had an MRI and I just phoned my surgery to see if the results were back yet, this time the receptionist said they were, but she's not allowed to access the documents.

Did this mean the first receptionist did something she wasn't meant to do by accessing both of my test results and telling me them?

Probably not. Put GPs will put a note in for reception when we phone for results. It probable that's what happened first time round, but this time the GO wants to see/talk to you to deliver whatever the result is.

No, receptionists can look and read the Drs comments on test results/X-rays etc.

Maybe the receptionist today is new/still training or, more likely, the report has been sent through but the dr hasn’t looked at the report and commented yet so the receptionist can’t tell you anything.

I've had lots of blood tests, xrays and MRI. For first two the receptionist will give results over for phone, for MRI have to speak to GP or consultant.

Oh I forgot to add, the day after the receptionist gave me my results, they rang me the next day to make an appointment to see the GP to get my results

@AintNobodyHereButUsChickens

Oh I forgot to add, the day after the receptionist gave me my results, they rang me the next day to make an appointment to see the GP to get my results

I don't think the receptionist did anything wrong. No matter what you add to it. They wouldn't be able to give the information if the doctor hasn't put it there for them to read.

It depends whether the GP has viewed and filed the report yet. In the first instance, it is likely that the GP had seen it and left some filing notes e.g. 'Bloods show low iron levels, prescription issued' or 'Tell patient chest X-ray shows improvement, book telephone appointment if wishes to discuss further'.

In the second instance, the receptionist could probably see the report was there but that it had not yet been viewed by the GP. Yes, technically we CAN access them but we don't normally as we're not clinically trained to interpret them and should certainly not be relaying information to the patient before the GP has seen them. In that case I'd send a message through to the GP to say the patient is asking for the results, should I book a phone appointment or is there anything that can be relayed?

A receptionist rang me up to say I needed to see a doctor after having receiving the results back from a smear. I asked her to tell me why and she summarised a letter they'd received from the lab. Only she summarised it wrongly. I don't think she wasn't allowed to tell me, I just think maybe that's why some of them don't.

@AintNobodyHereButUsChickens

Oh I forgot to add, the day after the receptionist gave me my results, they rang me the next day to make an appointment to see the GP to get my results

GPs all work in their own individual ways. For example, with the low iron or folate levels, one will do as I've said above, while another will ask us to book a telephone appointment for the GP to tell the patient. So perhaps in this instance, one GP had looked at the individual results and sent a message to reception (and not filed them), while their colleague will then view them in the context of ongoing investigations that the patient had been seeing them in particular for and send a message to admin to book an appointment. It happens. Very unlikely to be the receptionist's fault.