To turn up 30 mins late for a GP appointment

[Kasterborous]

I had a GP appointment today and turned up five mins before my appointment time, booked in it said only one person before me. So why did I have to wait 50mins with a bored 14 month old!! It pees me off every time I go its the same, so why can't I turn up 30 mins after my scheduled appointment time!?

disclaimer I know I am being a bit unreasonable but i didn't sleep well last night because this sodding eczema is itching like nobody's business

I just wonder, again, why are the slots only 10 minutes each? Someone (sorry I forget who) said that if each GP only saw half as many patients that would not help everyone much ... but would that actually cause a shortage of doctors?

B/c again the structure looks as if it's designed to make sure that the NHS is triple-safeguarded against inefficiency, by having 3 patients scheduled in the half hour needed by 1. By doing so, they never lose money. Instead, 2 out of every 3 patients lose money, per half hour. So if you have say 4 doctors in a practice and they work 8 hours a day, that's 32 hours. 64 half-hours. 128 people per day who are losing money waiting, just in that one practice.

I know this is crap math, a lot of guessing in it, but still, that's a lot of people losing money every time they go to the doctor.

And as Musical says "Just because we aren't seeing you doesn't mean we aren't doing patient care of some sort. You can't do it quickly or you make mistakes." This system really seems to penalize the doctors and nurses too: running all the time, literally no ability to do their work in the amount of time they are given to do it, and again why? Do you not have enough doctors in the country? Or not enough money to pay them unless they work at breakneck speed?

I don't understand why gp surgeries don't do evening and weekends? I mean people aren't just ill monday to friday between 8 and 6. I don't expect gps to work 7 days a week but they could do rotas like hospital staff do. Would make much more sense.

Surely for every other patient who takes longer than 10 minutes there will be some who take less than 10 minutes. I know i have been in an appointment for 5 minutes or less before. Not every patient takes longer than 10 minutes so there will be a catch up throughout the day.

Again that comes to having enough GPs to do it, realistically no practise is going to be able to get more GPs so it wouldn't mean that more patients could be seen just that they could be seen at different times of day.

In an ideal world there would be lots of money for lots of GPs to be there whenever we need them. But funds are very limited and that simply isnt possible

Sorry for all the Qs, this is really interesting to me, American, really dislike our healthcare system and have been gazingly longingly at GB and Canada's systems for a long time. So am always interested to get a sense of how it works out.

My clinic ran 20 mins late this afternoon . Most patients were fine but I did have one, really not very pleasant lady, who was not at all pleased to be kept waiting. I apologised but she said it wasn't good enough Unfortunately we had a poorly patient who needed sorting, I hope that patient is never her but maybe next time if it is she might be a little more sympathetic. All my other patients were so lovely and understanding about it.

Surely for every other patient who takes longer than 10 minutes there will be some who take less than 10 minutes.

IME rarely, usually patients do take the 10 mins, I usually do my catching up/paperwork/extra jobs/phonecalls when a patient DNAs.

GPs are essentially private businesses funded by the taxpayer so are not in any way free, lets dispel that myth right now. Have you ever met a poor GP ? Didn't think so.

It is frustrating because alot of the time people make appointments before work (they can start work at various time during the day) so when the dr is late by an hour you have the choice of being late for work or making a new appointment. Last week i had a big order on that had to be made and delivered by 12pm. I had a 9.10 appointment but wasn't seen until 10am. I was just going to cancel the appointment when i was called. It put me behind and i just got the dleivery there in time through rushing - being late makes my business look very bad. It's not just about being selfish, some have other commitments or important work on too.

Keatsie, I was puzzled by your referring it all back to money but now I see you are from the US!

GPs in the UK are not paid per consultation it is mainly by the numbers registered with the practice with some adjustments for case mix and some money for hitting performance targets so they wouldn't lose money by seeing less patients for longer appointments. What would happen is people would have to wait longer to get an appointment and then they'd complain about that.

The only way the practice would lose money I suppose would be if they employed an extra GP to mop up the extra time taken and then yes they would lose money. The money the government funds for is based on the current 10mins appt structure.

Many people regularly seeing their GP are retired or otherwise economically inactive so it's not really costing them money (unless they've parked on a meter!) therefore your economic analysis doesn't stack up.

well they could see less patients so that nobody had to wait but then they will only see half the amount of patients so thats not going to help patients much

Well yes, that's obvious.

I understand receptionists aren't going to know why the previous person hasn't come out of their appt in the case of an emergency but generally it's not an emergency, generally it's just running late so why can't they just tell you, "By the way, there's still 6 people to go in before you at the moment, just to let you know", then you'd be clear it was going to be a while and you'd better rearrange work/top up your parking/find something for dc's to do - think many people would be far happier that way.

Also wish there was more flexibility about how to access the GP - I could save my GP so much time if I could email them prior to an appt. Between the odd visit for myself and frequent visits for dc's and DP (long story but varying different health issues between them) I spend a lot of time explaining things that need explaining but take up a lot of time. If I could email it would be far quicker as I'm sure the GP could read a succinct explanation at least twice as quickly as I could explain in person while he or a dc pointlessly interrupts. Think it could be the same for someone with depression or a 'while I'm here' problem that they'll only start talking about as they're leaving - if they could notify the GP beforehand at their leisure about what the problem really is it would save time in the actual consultation when they might be scared/flustered/embarrassed/forgetful. I suppose I could just write things down and hand it to the GP but that just seems weird somehow.

I haven't read the whole thread but has anyone mentioned antenatal appointments? They take waiting to a whole new level.

"What would happen is people would have to wait longer to get an appointment and then they'd complain about that."

I phoned for an appointment in february to see doctor but couldn't get one for 3 weeks. When i get there i am told by the dr that what i want doing is only done by a certain dr. So i make an appointment with the dr who does it and couldn't get one for 4 weeks because she only does 2 days a week and is popular. So i go along to that appointment - 7 weeks after my first phone call to be told i would have to make another appointment to be checked. So another 3 weeks later i am checked, said dr want to make another appointment to do what i want done but had no appointments in that month and cannot do appointments more than a month ahead. So 10 weeks later i have to phone the surgery at the end of the month to arrange a telephone call with the dr so she can arrange an appointment with me (because she likes to do it herself).

Average appointment inmy surgery is 3-4 weeks wait unless it's an emergency that day when you phone at 8am.

GPs don't make more money every time they see a patient. They are paid roughly £80 / year for each patient on their list, whether they see them once or a hundred times. This is also why, although independent contractors, they are not really "small businesses" - more work does not mean more money.
Our surgery has an electronic screen where you check in and it tells you how long the wait is. Though sometimes it completely fails to check you in so that's helpful!

I work in NHS (not a GP or Nurse but I do work in a Health Centre and have booked appointments)

Some patients do take longer than their allotted time.
Some patients can take 5 minutes to get ready (ie remove clothing)
Some are requiring Dr letters to be written (and copied for our records)
Some have poor hearing or limited English or we have to write out instructions for a carer.

I've had patients knocking on my door (even though I put a sign up saying Please Do Not Knock)

I try my best to run on time. If I do run early, it does not mean I can get ahead because the next patient might not be there.
It's very difficult IME to not see a late patient. They come out with the same old same olds : "The buses/Parking/Well I always have to wait"

I would LOVE to say "Well if I'm running late you can refus to see me" . Maybe when I've taken The Brave Pills.

Two weeks ago our GP squeezed in an appointment to see DD, age 2, which will have caused everyone afterwards to have to wait. We're glad she did because we were told to take DD to hospital where she was admitted for 5 days.

Yes, it's crappy having to wait for 30 minutes but it sure as hell beats spending 5 days in hospital with a very ill toddler.

I have worked as a GP's receptionist, if we apologised to patients and said the doctors were running late we were grumbled at, if the doctor came out into the waiting room (very friendly family surgery) and apologised for running late the patients were all smiles and 'don't worries'.

I quite often worked an extra hour/hour and a half while we cleared the backlog / saw more emergencies / waited for ambulances etc.

Its not just doctors though, our dentist is nearly always 30-40 mins behind.

Our receptionists are fab, absolutely fab, they put up with a lot more than I have to. Sadly one of our receptionists walked out recently she was so badly verbally abused, she's not coming back

Chocolate I don't understand why gp surgeries don't do evening and weekends?

Our doctors surgery has appointments from 8am -11.30am then 2pm - 8pm and saturday morning.

Please don't be annoyed. I work in primary care, I am often late. I hate it and i know everyone I work with would love to be on time for every patient, but it is because we are generally overworked and have a very limited time to see, assess and make decisions on the patients we see and care we give.
It is always for a genuine reason. The nhs is a system that is struggling to cope with the amount of people I this country, unfortunately this all comes down to money and I actually think that despite this it is amazing, and if you are really sick, you get the best care in the world.

XBenedict a patient at another surgery, on turning up and demanding to be seen, SPAT at the receptionist because there were no appts left.

Lets just say, within five minutes, he was banned from every surgery within a 5 mile radius.

Also it may take 10 mins to see the patient, it then can take the same time to write notes, do prescriptions, do referrals and anything else that goes with that consultation.

YANBU for being stressed by having to entertain a bored toddler. However your GP INBU for running late.

I'm a GP. We see 18 patients in a row at 10 minute intervals. Even if each patient runs only 2 minutes over-time, by the end of the surgery I'll be running 36 minutes late. Most patients have more than one issue to discuss and there is usually at least one major problem per surgery, often more. Major problems can include heart attacks, acute psychosis needing sectioning under the Mental Health Act and new disclosures of child abuse. If there is a GP out there who can deal with any of those issues in 10 minutes, I've yet to meet her. Also, 40% of my patients are non-English speaking which takes extra time too.

I'd love to go to 15 minute appointments so things are less rushed but this would reduce the number of appointments available.

Ewww Gemma that's awful .