WIBU to leave (consultant appointment)

[onemiddlefinger]

I've been waiting now for 40min, somebody has taken my blood pressure in the waiting room, no sign of the consultant.
It's an antenatal appointment but I'm not actually sure why i need it.
It's in the middle of a work day, i need to get back.

she hasn't received sub-standard care, she had to wait to see a doctor.

Chocolate thank you, and congratulations on your fourth uncomplicated pregnancy. As someone with recurrent miscarriage issues, it is lovely to hear someone appreciate what a difficult journey it can be, and you're right, I have learnt about all five of my MCs through EPU or consultant appts. The support and time given to me have been essential.

Yes there is always someone worse off, but NHS inefficiency is infuriating and I don't blame the OP for being annoyed. The NHS is light years behind other organisations in basic organisation and communication skills for booking appointments etc.

DC recently needed a hearing appointment and we were sent a letter in the post that offered an appointment time we couldn't make. We rang up to change it but they could only cancel it and say another date would be sent in the post-which we couldn't do again! No doubt MN would say we should cancel family holiday and a school trip rather than the NHS allow us to speak to the receptionist with the clinic diary on the phone!

I had a similar experience a few weeks ago. I've now requested that my GP manages my condition instead - could you do similar?

Whilst seeing a consultant was a massive waste of time for me, it was also a massive waste of time for him when there were/are people with complications and problems which needed his attention. I didn't (luckily, I realise).

It very much felt like a box ticking exercise, even if it wasn't.

I waited 50 minutes for a consultant once, went and asked the receptionist if I was going to be taken soon. I had to get my eldest from school. 5 minutes later the door opposite opens and the consultant tells me to come in. She hadn't even had a patient in! I was fuming!

Old community hospital, one door in and out.

Of course there is always someone worse off - but that doesn't mean that we can't get frustrated when we are "inconvenienced", and why we, as NHS staff reviewing our services, shouldn't look to identify problems and do something to improve the patient's experience. Sitting back, shrugging our shoulders at their inconveniences, and claiming that long waits with no explanation of why patients are there in the first place and why they are being kept waiting is something that patients should accept (or at least, not complain about) because it's a 'free' service is no good at all.

'Pared to the bone' maternity care wasn't what I experienced in the US system, either privately insured or public. I rarely waited more than fifteen minutes for a scheduled cattle call appointment with an OB/GYN and had all my testing done at the same time - glucose, etc. Cattle call appointments were scheduled for every hour, never 9 am or 2 pm. Even so, my exFIL was flabbergasted that OB/GYNs and pediatricians operated a cattle call appointment system or that anyone would be waiting more than five to ten minutes for their scheduled appointment. He was a surgeon and saw his pre and post op patients at the time of their appointments, with no waiting room full of disgruntled people.

I remember about 20 years ago a big brouhaha about arrogant doctors who would charge you for an appointment you missed without notifying the practice but who expected patients to sit around for hours wasting their valuable time while waiting for their 10 minutes with the doctor. It seemed that doctors whose patients were mainly women (OB/GYN and pediatrician offices where women were bringing their children for visits) were the worst offenders, perhaps thinking that women had nothing better to do with themselves than sit around looking through old magazines. Since then many doctors make a point of emphasising that they value their patients' time.

Your time is as valuable as the doctor's, and just because you are having a baby doesn't mean you should be expected to put up with long waits when a little effort on the part of the doctor to figure out a better time management system could make a difference. That would require a slight adjustment of perspective and priorities on the part of the doctor.

happy - yes your situation is annoying and I can see the frustration. However, the OP is failing to recognise 50 minutes is not a long time to wait nor does she recognise that with antenatal care, she has no idea the circumstances of the patient who has gone in before her (or before that etc). As has already been highlighted, most women only find out at these appointments if something terrible has happened. Her grievance is really insensitive because she hasn't thought for one moment about why the consultant may be held up.

Scots - doctors do not sit in their room having a nap! THere was every chance they were writing letters, sorting out additional care for the previous patient, or doing a dictation etc.

The general tone of this thread is that the doctors are trying to waste everyone's time, which is ridiculous.

Yes of course, when I come and call a patient from the waiting room after a gap, I've been filing my nails and drinking coffee.

Not taking an emergency call from a colleague, dealing with urgent results, writing up the notes from the last patient, taking a phone call from a patient ......none of those.

I think the bigger issue is that you dont understand why you were referred to the consultant.

I can see why you are annoyed - but I think better any communication could have helped this situation. You dont have to be passive though and accept dr knows best. Ask questions! Enter into a dialogue. You generally freel more satisfied if you understand what's going on.

I had to attend the antenatal clinic in my last pregnancy and I never waited less than three hours. It was very frustrating as I had two other children to think about. However all the staff were great. I had my older children abroad and my experience of pregnancy and birth was ten times better under the NHS.
I do think the NHS needs to shape up in terms of organising appointments. At the antenatal clinic it seemed like everyone was told to come at the same time and then sit and wait.
Somebody earlier said people were being critical of doctors. I think there is an element of consultants not respecting patients. My dh's cousin is a obstetrics registrar in a large hospital. He recently told dh he is disgusted by the attitude of some of the consultants towards patients, and being late to clinics is one of his bugbears. He actually told dh he wanted to make a complaint about a superior and dh told him ffs don't ruin your career! Perhaps he's just young and idealistic.

The general tone of this thread is that the doctors are trying to waste everyone's time

No it's not - no-one has said that or even inferred it (or rather, the general tone hasn't said/inferred that) at all.

Green - I'm really interested from a service review pov. When your clinics are running late, how do your colleagues at the desk inform patients who are joining the waiting room of the delay? What's the process/mechanism?

sirchengin ^I waited 50 minutes for a consultant once, went and asked the receptionist if I was going to be taken soon. I had to get my eldest from school. 5 minutes later the door opposite opens and the consultant tells me to come in. She hadn't even had a patient in! I was fuming!

Old community hospital, one door in and out.^

This poster is suggesting the doctor was intentionally time wasting, no? Please explain how to interpret differently?

Why would doctors be writing letters on a day when they are seeing patients, or calling patients from a waiting room themselves? Are notes hand written?

I saw this on FB the other day:

"Yes I really do feel terrible Sir that you have been here for 5 hours. Yes I do think it's horrible that none of the nurses have been able to offer you a cup of tea. Yes I am really appalled that there are no beds and you elderly relative has been stuck on a trolley for the whole time. I am very sorry and can only insist we are doing our very best... I'm sorry that's not good enough... I'm sorry that you think we're all "fucking idiots".

I'm also sorry that the paediatric arrest I just left (after 2-3 hours of our best efforts) was unsuccessful. I'm sorry that the 45 year old VF arrest at the wheel had no wallet on him so I can't find his family to be with him on intensive care. Im sorry that the elderly head injury on warfarin has no surviving relatives and will die of their massive brain bleed with only a stranger holding her hand. I'm sorry that 4 nurses, 2 doctors and 2 health care assistants have been caught up dealing with this all. I'm sorry that they will all be late home and will probably miss their children who will have probably gone to bed. I'm sorry that they will find a way to put a smile back on their face and will probably stay a little longer to help toilet your relative and bring you all a cup of tea just because they are good kind people and not because they are being paid to.

I'm sorry that I cannot magically fix the massive deficit in beds which has slowed the flow through A&E to a snails pace. Im sorry that the powers that be saw fit to close thousands and thousands of beds creating this problem. I'm sorry that no matter what we do there will always be something we are not doing right.

I'm just sorry and so should you be!"

We all understand that the NHS has flaws, and we all want to be seen on time. But the nature of a hospital and having highly skilled, experienced doctors is that it is unpredictable.

I maintain that 50 minutes is not a long time to wait.

It's really disgraceful to make patients feel bad about complaining when service is poor.

Thank you Chocolate , I'm on the same recurrent miscarriage thread as Tanny and like her, I found out my baby had died at a routine scan and was incredibly grateful at the time taken by the Sonographer and the EPAU nurse to ensure I knew all my options and the next steps. So yes I probably made the person after me late. But it's refreshing to hear other people recognise our pain.

linerunner thank you for your kind words.

Mathsanxiety BUT TO WAIT 50 MINUTES IS NOT "POOR SERVICE". This is what I am struggling with - and the absolute lack of empathy for the patients before that might have had bad news.

The OP went to an antenatal appointment and should be delighted to hear that both she and her baby are fine.

And if she looked in her hospital book, I am sure she will find the tick list that refers to why she was given a consultant appointment (or alternatively, she should have asked) - in my case: previous large babies, varicose veins (nice!), PCOS.

Poor Service is a doctor who fails in their duty of care resulting in an outcome that could have been avoided e.g. sick mother or dead baby.

There is a bigger picture as to why doctors "run late".

No - you said the general tone of this thread. The general tone has not been that doctors are wasting everyone's time. That was one post - and you should ask that poster to explain what they meant, as opposed to claiming that the general tone has been that doctors are wasting everyone's time, when it patently hasn't been.

I repeat my earlier posts - we are currently reviewing a major service because we do not believe that patients are best served by long, unexplained waits.

And what you've described is not poor service - that is classed as something far more serious.

YABU. I once waited over two hours to see my Consultant when pregnant because there'd been an emergency with a woman in labour and 2 out of the 3 Consultants in the clinic had to leave to attend to her.

Was it annoying - yes.

Did I moan and complain about it? Of course not. I told myself that one day in the future it may be a serious emergency of my own that meant Consultants had to be with me and cause a delay in Clinic. I would like to think that if I was having serious problems in labour and needed immediate medical attention that I'd be a priority over people having an outpatient appointment. So I sat there patiently and waited to be seen whilst hoping that the woman and the baby the Consultants were with were ok

SirChengin - surely the only reason the visit was unexplained is that the OP didn't ask?

No one can argue with the fact that the NHS has many issues and yes, waiting times are extremely frustrating. Anyone with medical friends can talk ad infinitum about the time and money wasting that goes on. But please, 50 minutes is not a long wait, especially when the outcome is essentially that the mum and baby are okay.

And what I really struggle with in this particular thread is that the OP was mostly upset that she hadn't had lunch and was running late for a meeting because she had had to attend an appointment and wait (for not very long!). Had the outcome of the appointment been different, I sure she would have required much more of the doctors time and not thought twice about the meeting.

The OP should have asked, yes - but equally the MW should certainly have explained why she was referring her to the Consultant before the OP had to ask.

Of course she wouldn't have thought twice about the length of time the appointment took if the outcome had not been positive. Receiving tragic or bad news means that you think about nothing else, but that doesn't mean that patients should not be a)told why they are being referred onto a Consultant, without the patient asking, and b)they should be kept waiting for long periods without being informed that there is a delay - and they certainly shouldn't be made to feel guilty for feeling frustrated, or feel that because it's a 'free' service (which it isn't) they can't complain.

What we're trying to do it to make it easier for patients to feed back to the service re how they found the experience, and then to look at how we can improve things. Surely that's the way we want our healthcare service to function as opposed to long, unexplained waits and appointments they don't know the purpose of?

If you have further appointments ask for them to be the first of that clinic and explain that as you work, you're trying to minimise the amount of time off in the run up to the birth.

I was able to have all appointments (and there were quite a few due to various issues arising in pregnancy) booked for first thing in the morning, although this still sometimes meant being seen at 9.20 when the appointment was for 9.00am but was infinitely preferable to waiting up to an hour and then my boss at work asking why I'd "been away so long when my appointment was at x time".

If you get sent an appointment date/time letter, ring up and ask for a different date with a first thing in the morning clinic appointment. I'm not sure how the clerks did it but they always managed to find me one.

If the OP didn't know why the MW had booked her for a consultant appointment, she should have bloody asked! Be an active participant in your care