How does your doctors booking system work?

[Queen9875]

Getting increasingly frustrated with my doctors surgery and contemplating joining a new practice. You cannot book an appointment in advance, as they only offer on the day appointments which you need to ring at 8am for and wait in an hour long queue before you even get through, by which point, all appointments are gone. I don't have time to be sitting around on the phone all morning as I have kids to sort out and a job to get to. How on earth am I meant to get an appointment? I really need to go, but am yet to be able to get myself an appointment. Is this the norm for all doctors now?

Pre-pandemic you could call on the day when the surgery opened for a sane day appointment. Often had to wait in a queue but once you were through, 90% of the time could get a face to face appointment. Or you could call after 10.30am and get an appointment in the next two weeks. It worked pretty well.

Now? A joke system. You have to fill out an e-consult. A day later you get a text telling you to either call 111 or that you have a telephone consultation (usually within 2 weeks). They never call when they say they will. No choice in the slot you’re allocated. Calls are really rushed and you feel like you’re inconveniencing them. It’s like bashing your head against a brick wall to get a face to face appointment.

Call up. Gp calls back that morning if called them before 12
If i call after 2 i get a call the afternoon. Ive had calls gone 8pm of a Friday and busy shes amazing.
Always if one of the dcs who suffers with chest will see within an hour or two after call.

I called for 1 dc the other day. Left message with reception for a previous issue so knew what needed. Within less than 30 min i had a text saying the prescription was with chemist. Then a text from chemist saying ready to collect.

When 1 dc was really ill on a Sunday called 111. No call back by 10pm. They called and said it be by midday Monday. By then id called gp. Been seen and home by 10am with meds.

I am really lucky

You don’t.
You read up your symptoms online, treat if possible and hopefully eventually they clear up or alternatively you die. At least then you won’t be worrying about funny lumps.
Can you see I am frustrated at not being able to see a doctor despite trying since August.

Where we previously lived it was a case of sitting in a phone queue for an hour or queuing outside the surgery at 07.30am onwards to get a same day appointment (future, as in 3 weeks in the future appointments were available to book on-line). During Covid they brought in an online triage service which worked really well. You would get phone call from Dr same day or next day. They would ask you to come in if necessary.

Moved to rural N Yorks in 2021 and registered with local practice. Nearly fell off my chair when the receptionist answered in 2 rings when I phoned to book an appointment! Dr rings you back and you are asked to come in if necessary. Usually same day. Feel very lucky.

in the main, mine has been good. To be seen on the day, you call up at 8am and hope you get through. I always have. Mine also ASK if you want F2F or phone call. I have also been able to ask them to call me after 2pm, if I myself am in clinic seeing patients of my own. When I've been in person, the waiting room is always full. If you want to pre-book, you can no longer do this online, you ring up, and the appointment is usually a couple of weeks away. Anything else, I do an e-consult form, which has worked really well in the past. I submitted an e-consult one afternoon about being low in mood, the receptionist called within 30 minutes to see if I was OK, and I was seeing the GP within another 1and half hours.
My parents' practice is an absolute disgrace, but my parent shave been at that practice for 62 years and won't leave it.

Ours have recently added booking online for non urgent appointments which are a phone call. This has made things a lot easier for me as mine don't tend to be urgent.
If you want an urgent appointment then have to ring at 8 and see how lucky you are.

Call at 8am. I always get an appointment. I leave the phone on loud speaker while I get on with my chores. Recently I wanted to see a certain doctor so I went in and booked an appointment 2 weeks ahead.

Ours is amazing but it's a small rural affluent town where GPs want to work I suppose.

I did an e-consult a few weeks ago at 2pm and GP called me at 5.15pm and left me a prescription.

I've had two face to face appts since October.

Also last Xmas at the height of omicron I called about a lump I'd found and I was able to sit and wait for the nurse practitioner in the reception until the end of her appts.

We were back in the waiting room almost as soon as the jabs were rolled out.

Our receptionist bends over backwards to squeeze in appointments for you.

We are very lucky.

Badly! econsult first, 50 questions which takes you about 20 mins to fill in. I have learnt to go easy on the description of symptoms as you will be advised to head to A&E numerous times eg for a headache over level 5. They will ask you what you think they should do (thought Doctors were supposed to do this) and find a reason not to do it. If they are in a collaborative mood you might get a phone call to explain why they cannot do it, for example, 'there is not much known about female hormones - it is experimental what we can provide'. Absolutely impossible to get through on the one phone line.

Seriously if I every get anything seriously wrong me with I think I will just jump off a cliff.

Ours you fill in an online form, then usually they send you a slot for a phone appointment. If cannot be resolved over phone, they give you an in person appointment.

The trick with econsult is to answer the bare minimum of questions and put all your info in the free form boxes.

Call at 8am and see if you can get through, it’s a lottery. This will only be a phone appointment unless they deem it necessary for you to come in. Or, you can download the NHS app and book the initial telephone appointment through that - but this will be for about 10 days later.

If your company offers any kind of healthcare schemes, it’s worth having a look at to see what’s included. Our employee package includes BUPA - I can get a video call GP appointment in 15 mins, prescription sent to my local pharmacy same day.
I had shingles a few months ago, which needs treatment to be started within three days of symptoms showing to be most effective.
They were absolutely brilliant and I’d gone from looking at how to make the appointment to having taken the first dose within a few hours. Didn’t have to pay for the appointment upfront or wait for it to be reimbursed as you log in with your cover details. All sorted on their side.
I was only charged for the medication itself (about £7 IIRC, so similar to an NHS prescription charge).
I likely wouldn’t have got a GP appointment within the 3 day timeframe and the infection could have been a lot harder to treat.

I’m only mentioning this as we’ve have employees say they didn’t know what it was, what it actually covered or how to use it! It’s absolutely worth asking about.

Fuck knows. We've had the "on the Day only, call at 8am" thing for years. Some receptionists seem to think we still do. Others seem to let you book in advance.

But 99% of the time they book me an appointment and then tell me its at the 'other' surgery. Which is 2 fucking bus rides away. I'm registered at my LOCAL surgery, as per the rules when I moved here. But they can now seemingly send me across time and get huffy when I explain (yet again) that I cannot get to the other surgery.

Advance appointments can be booked through patient access or the NHS app. Same day/emergency appointments by phone.

Annoyingly if you want a nurse or phlebotomy appointment you need to phone to make that appointment, but otherwise it works well.

No pre booked appointments except bloods and smears.
Cant get through at 8:30am usually because even though you phone on the dot, I always seem to be way back in the telephone queue and when I get to the front they are full to capacity.
The only way is to queue outside the surgery from 7:45 There is a huge queue by opening time. If you have a school run to do you can forget it if you want a doctors appointment unless you have someone to care for them and take them from 7:45.
Its absolutely bonkers. Why oh why don’t we have anything online in 2022? Standing outside in a queue on the freezing cold at 7:45 like we are in post war Britain

I moved to the area a year ago. The GP here is a phone call at 8am to get a same day appointment! Cannot make appointments in advance.

Apparently they used to do online booking, however people were able to book more than one appointment at a time (as a back up in case they needed to cancel one) then would not turn up for the "back up" appointment or would not cancel it. Abusing the system basically.

However I do have access to private healthcare with my employer so I think if I ever find myself with a serious problem, I would use that.
Fortunately I haven't needed to see a GP in years! Just smear test appointments.

I ring up and go into a queue, which I think is much better than getting an engaged tone. On a Monday morning, my queue position will be about 37. Eventually, I get through to a receptionist, who quizzes me and decides if I get an appointment with a nurse, a GP or no one at all.

The last time I needed the GP, I had a phone appointment booked for three weeks’ time. The GP then confirmed that he did need to see me, so he booked me a face-to-face appointment himself, for a few days later.

This was dependent on me being able to get to “the other surgery” which is out of town, in a village.

My surgery is terrible and really putting patients at risk, goodness knows how they were judged outstanding. You have to fill in a Klinik e consult form and they should call you back the same day with a telephone consultation. Unfortunately after my last telephone consultation where we agreed a 2 week supply of medication, the Dr decided to change his mind and only send an online prescription for 1 weeks supply. He didn’t tell me and I only noticed by accident. This could have caused me huge problems as I would have run out whilst abroad. I have tried to contact both the GP and practice manager but neither are responding, my Klinik requests are ignored too. When I try and call I have to wait in a queue (usually position 12/13) when I get to position 1 it either cuts me off or sends me to voicemail and says it’s full so I can’t leave a message.

My daughter had a telephone consultation and a face to face was arranged a week later, when she attended the doctor started telling her about some previous test results not why she had arranged the appointment and told her time’s up so that can’t be discussed, the screen said the purpose of the appointment but she just didn’t bother reading it.

My friends husband was fobbed off and repeatedly told he only had muscle pain, luckily his doctor friend noticed something was seriously wrong and sent him to A & E. It turns out he had a serious blood clot.

I'm definitely moving to a different practice in the new year. This one definitely needs to be shut down.

Fill in a form online between 8am and 12noon. It's quite detailed, asks a lot about symptoms etc.

They'll be a reply and depending on how urgent/illness etc they'll call or offer you a telephone appointment or face to face.

I filled a form in for per-menopause symptoms. One or two are making me a bit miserable. I received a date for a telephone appointment for two weeks later. I set my alarm to remind me. They called, I missed it (signal rubbish), the called a few hours later and when I went to answer it I accidentally cancelled the call. It's a line you can't call back.

I was so frustrated but also upset they I'd wasted their time and now feel rubbish about re-booking.

@ImOutOfTouch try again if you can. It is frustrating, as you don’t know when the call is coming you can’t make sure you are somewhere where suitable to discuss confidential matters. I don’t want to discuss gynaecology issues in the Sainsbury’s queue. An automated text message to say the Dr is going to call you next would help both doctors and patients alike.

In theory you can book advance appointments about a month in advance on NHS app but there is only a permanent message saying no appointments available when you go in to book. Apart from that you are told to ring in the morning to get same day which involves repeat speed dialling from exactly 8am for one hour then finally getting through to be told all appointments gone, try again tomorrow. This is repeated daily for up to a month until the patient accepts that either their ailment will get better on its own or will kill them.

At ours you can book in advance or call at 8am on the day for urgent appointments, works reasonably well as if someone is sick enough for an on the day appointment we're not going anywhere anyway. I even managed to get an appointment for DS when I called at 10.30 after he got worse. Although it is a 3-4 week wait for advance appointments which can be annoying.

Call at 8am for on the day/urgent appointments, join a queue and hope you were quick enough. For non-urgent, they ‘open the book’ on a Monday for appointments two weeks out. Those also get booked out after a few hours so you are told to try again next Monday. Useless.

But mainly what this thread shows is that there are many many ways to manage GP appointments - some lo-tech, some hi-tech. Why is there not an agreed Best Practice that they all use? I suspect this is an example of the famed NHS ‘inefficiencies.’