How long should you wait after your doctor’s appointment time?

[DCPEN]

Hi,

Letting off some steam here, so apologies but I would appreciate some perspectives on how patient (no pun intended!) I should be.

Routine NHS clinic appointment to monitor long term condition. First appointment for the day is at 9:30. Have some pre appointment checks that that up to 30 minutes depending on the wait.

Then the wait begins, a quick clinic trip involves an average 60 minute wait after the tests, even when I have the first appointment of the day.

Today, I had a later appointment at 10:30 and when checking with the reception desk at 12:40, was told that clinic ends at 13:00 and all the remaining patients (i.e. those from 10:30 onwards, I assume) would be seen by 13:00 so lunch breaks could be taken and before afternoon clinic begins. I had arrived at 10:15 and my tests were finished by 10:45, so I’d had a two hour sit in the waiting room by then. No idea how the quality of care was going to suffer by rushing the end of the clinic appointments when it was already so badly delayed.

I unfortunately hadn’t been able to arrange the afternoon off work as well, so had to say ‘sorry, but I’ve got to go’.

My work is pretty supportive about time off, but non NHS routine users just don’t understand it’s a huge amount of ‘hurry up and wait’.

Funnily, my last manager had a one off NHS appointment and sent an apology text to me after sitting in the waiting room for over an hour for his appointment saying he finally understood why I’d be gone all day.

I have waited up to four hours for a quick chat with the doctor before in the clinic. Appreciate the demand for the NHS is mad; but there must be better way of managing this? Why do first clinic appointments still involved an hour’s wait for the doctor? Are we actually expected to wait all day for a scheduled appointment? Should I and if so, at what point, should I just walk out?

Economically speaking this means the NHS inefficiency is costing the country twice with the amount of time workers need to take off and we’re only getting sicker :(

Rant over. Interested to hear your thoughts and experiences, I can’t be alone with this frustration!

First clinic appointment doesn’t always mean first work of the day though - they may have been to see patients on wards or been called to emergencies.

long waits should be communicated to patients as soon as possible though

What clinc is this?
Don't think I've had to wait this long unless it's A&E or out of hours for years. My regular doctors has been an hour late before but that's been the worst. My normal hospital clinic is normally fairly on time. When I've been for tests recently they have been rather timely as well.

Not sure but was at an NHS appointment at a private hospital yesterday (NHS outsourcing).
There was a notice to patients on the wall saying that if you had been waiting for longer than 30 minutes, let reception know to ensure that the consultant is aware that you are waiting to be seen.

Different bloody world!

Is the chat with the doctor after blood results come through or a general quick check on BP or symptoms pre bloods?

Depends on the clinic.

Eye clinic- be prepared to be there forever bitter experience

I became a lot more tolerant about GP delays after what happened with my then baby DD.

She became ill overnight. Rang first thing for an appointment. Receptionist heard baby screaming on phone, so it was upgraded to see first doctor available. I got there half an hour later (after dressing toddler and baby, and feeding toddler!) And was seen within minutes. Then that doctor called the other doctor in... so we occupied 2 doctors for 30 minutes. And she was sick all over the office.

So by 10am... they were already 30 minutes plus behind. The waiting room was packed when we left.

Having been on the other side of this it will be because there will be at least 4 people booked into every appointment slot. Clinics are routinely overbooked so that the waiting lists are not longer. So even if you have the first appt there might be 4 people in that same slot plus the same consultant and registrar will often need to do a round of their ward inpatients first. They'll have been working flat out since pre 8am not chatting or having a coffee.

We don't want it to be like this. It horrible when every patient is already in a foul mood with you because they've been waiting 2 hours and don't understand that we really have been working flat out but the clinic is overbooked. The only solution is to work through lunch. I have never eaten lunch I am just used to it. The best I have ever managed is a sandwich at my desk and usually not even that as I have no time to buy or make one. Hey ho fasting is good for you (eating biscuits for lunch probably not so much)

Stuff like this needs to be reformed. If it's a quick chat about routine management of a long term condition then surely a telephone or video appt would do the same job and you could have that from your workplace. It was able to be done during Covid so why not now?

During the pandemic it was a blessed relief for my mum when her oncology appts went to phone calls which she could have from her bed and save her the pain and discomfort of a many hours round trip to the hospital (never could the clinic conveniently be on the same day as her chemo or radiotherapy appts that was impossible to arrange) Then bizarrely she was told it had all gone back to face to face and she had to attend with no option for the Dr just to call her in that same appt slot. She's dead now but that piece of NHS fuckery always upset me.

The problem is that the NHS always seems to try to fix this by making things more "effiecient" - by attempting to get clinical staff to do more work in a given time period. The issue is that that reached maximum work per time a long time ago.