To think it is no wonder people go to A and E unnecessarily

[Keremy]

I have a series of medical problems and history of a lot of operations and pain.
I have been in agony for a week and unable to sleep. All I need is tablets I previously had on repeat prescription but haven't had in a few months as I haven't needed them but obviously I can't get them without seeing the doctor because of time frame which I understand but I can't get an appointment!

Our doctors has a system where you call when they open for appointments that day. I've called, I've been in but no luck.

I want to cry.

Barbarian,

That is not the cost per call. The running cost does not change depending on the number of calls (or certainly not exactly). You have to ask yourself why it costs so much? Someone is making a lot of money from it and I doubt it is the operatives.

Too much on consultants and overpaid NHS 'managers' (who are often ex nurses who suddenly triple their salaries to do a less important job).

And I mean management consultants, not medical consultants.

Keremy did you see anyone?

I wouldn't have believed that cost for 111 either based on my personal experience. However, I know somebody who called recently for an elderly relative. 111 sent an ambulance and insisted on staying on the line with them until it arrived. 3 hours later still no ambulance (relative taken to A&E in desperation) - so that would have been a pretty expensive call for them.

This is a person who had been trying to see a GP for weeks, but before Christmas couldn't be given an appointment until late January: I suspect if they had been given an appointment the whole thing could have been avoided. We desperately need more GP capacity but it is patchy: my local surgery is great and I can always get an appointment urgently if needed, and usually within a couple of days even for non-urgent issues. My sister lives 2 miles away and has similar problems getting a GP appointment to those set out up thread.

It's because of this kind of situation that I stockpile medication prescriptions for my chronic pain condition- they seem to have no comprehension that you may have been without a drug for a couple of months but you may still actually need it again, & seemingly no care that it takes me an hour to get the bus from work to the GP surgery to pick up a prescription and often take holiday hours to do so, so when they issue too few (this happens too often IME), it requires a repeat trip the week after and several phone calls to ensure they actually get it right this time.
I get that they're trying to make sure they're not dishing drugs out like sweeties, but it does seem like they're not using common sense sometimes, although I guess they're so stretched on resources that details get missed and cause more work for the staff.

Rant and explanation alert

People on here Do not understand how GPs work and the pressure we were under. Yes we did get a big rise in 2004 but that was to bring us in line with what we should have been getting. They thought we weren't doing the work so brought in a points system. 1050 points. We achieved 1039 in the first year. We were doing everything. We actually failed the last 11 points as we had no one on the particular drug that we were having to monitor. The government made a mistake there. I think they thought we would get 600 in year one and gradually increase.

I have been a GP for 25 years. The job has changed beyond recognition. When I started we worked 8-6 and did our share of out of hours and weekends. But I would see patients from 8.30 to 10 then a break for repeat prescriptions, maybe 20, then a small pile of letters then a visit, even nursing homes then a nice break at lunch then a couple of short surgeries and home apart from my on call nights,
Now I go in for 7, do paperwork till 8 see patients and answer phonecalls until, 1 do audits, deal with business matters and the health board with my manager do visits, do over 100 prescriptions between 2 of us plus sign anothe 200 of the ordinary repeats. Etc etc. I finish at 7 at night and I go home exhausted. The EWTD doesn't apply to us. We just keep going.

I cannot think straight by 6pm. Every letter we look at needs a clinical decision made on it. We deal with far more complex stuff than 25 years ago.
I am part time through choice, our senior partner has just cut his sessions from 9 to 6 per week and feels so much better for it and is a better doctor for it.
We cannot get GPs this is why you can't get appointments. No one wants to be one. Remember too if you only work part time you only get paid part time plus part time GPs have other outside commitments (meetings in management boards which someone has to do) so may be doing that in their days off. Also training new GPs takes time too.

The income quoted in the daily mail is the income some surgeries get BUT out of this we have to pay our staff our heating our rent our repairs our telephone systems our postage our paper our envelopes from this.
Do some of you realise that this is not the take home pay. I am just about to employ a salaried GP. I will pay her around £50k on top of that I will have to pay £7k employers sulerannuation and £5k employers national insurance so that's 25% roughly of her salary that I pay to the pensions and government on top of her salary which comes out of mine and the other partners pay.
My staff budget is 25% of our income so if I earn 100k £25k goes to pay staff. (I don't earn this)

There is a surgery near us that has lost 4 GPs over the last year and cannot recruit.

This is scotland . It is far far worse in England.
Please write to your MPs and Jeremy hunt to get us more funding and staff because otherwise you will all be paying for your appointments and do not accuse GPs of having an easy time. It is simply not true.
There are some very disorganised surgeries but on the whole we try our best.

Keremy, I do sympathise. I would have given you some to tide you over and got you in to see us when the post christmas Rush calms down.
Some surgeries do cut their noses off to spite their face.

Try your best?

I needed to be seen three or four times in the last few years. Only one time did I manage to get an appointment and then I did see a locum who didnt care in the slightest and didn't do the necessary tests.
I get receptionists being rude all every single time I ring.

I'm beyond caring about your plight.

Chardonnay, I am sorry you have had a bad time. I have experienced rude receptionists too and my family have had the odd bad experience with GPs too. I do feel very angry about that but to tar everyone with the same brush is simply not fair.
I think everyone needs to start caring about our plight.
It is only when that happens that there may be pressure on the government to help us out of this mess.

Sorry Musical, i did get carried away.
But it's a nightmare and it keeps getting worse.

I just want to know I will be able to see a doctor when I need it and that they will pay at least some attention to me when I finally manage to get an appointment.
It's pretty basic.

Are these private GP clinics? Where I live, you ring in the morning and are seen that day and at worst the following day. It is unheard of to wait any longer. GP visits cost in the region of fifty pounds per visit.

See I read threads like this and I just don't understand why there isn't some sort of centralised consistency about surgeries.

Our surgery recently merged with another although there's been no real change. You can drop in of a morning for a five minute drop in appointment or call for a 15 minute one. I've only ever had to wait longer than a week because I wanted a specific doctor and she's only part time, and they were fab, creating an appointment when I called to say my twins had suspected mumps. They even do minor surgery. Next door is a walk in centre as well. Even the receptionists are great!

It must be so frustrating.

Hohumming where are you this is the NHS we don't pay directly at all.

Chardonnay have some

Can you choose to pay privately to get seen that day though?

I have to admit to not understanding complaining when it is totally free unless there is no other option.

It's not free though is it? Everyone who pays any sort of tax is paying for it and if you need to see a GP and can't if course you should complain!

Must say my GP has been excellent and I've never had to wait too long for an appointment. I do understand other people's experience is different.

To those GP bashing above. Please explain to me why there is a recruitment crisis and nobody wants to do the job if you perceive it to be such a rude. FFS!

Hellochicken

I probably don't think you should be on call alternate nights forever.

Though . . .

My late DF was a GP and did this through the 60s and 70s. He disliked it a lot but ultimately saw it as part of the job.

Musicaltheatremum that is the nature of the public sector these days. We saw the workload rise, T&Cs cut and stagnating pay in the Forces prior to my leaving. Turns out at the time 2013 I wasn't the only one and my old camp was haemorrhaging highly experienced and highly trained (at a very expensive cost to the tax payer) to the private sector in great numbers. So much so that they had to vastly increase to exit time to reduce the operational impact of all the troops seeking better careers in the private sector and taking their skills, experience and training with them. Luckily just after I got out. I have friends in Nursing, teaching, the forces (obviously), the prison service and the police. They all say the same thing. Over worked, under staffed and constantly seeing a degradation of there terms and conditions. Morale is of an all time low in the public sector and many are literately voting with their feet and leaving.

What is the options for a doctor in the private sector? I would image with things the way they are in the NHS the private sector market would be over saturated with former NHS staff seeking private sector jobs?

I am probably paranoid but does anyone think the torries would like people use private health care more due to frustration with the NHS?

The increasing availability of private health services and people using them more does start to normalise the idea of private health care. A normalisation that could aim to move towards the direction changing the NHS as we know it or even end it.

Nope no one rang me back and now they are closed. I've set the alarm for morning and will go back again in person in the morning but I shouldn't have to traipse there in pain with no solution again.

As I said above most of my family is NHS so I do get it but I'm in pain and fed up. I've got over the counter stuff.

I've had some really really terrible care in the NHS (missed diagnoses of something very serious as ibs when I could feel lumps and gp failed to examine me) but they have also saved mine and my dc1s life.

But I feel so frustrated right now.

I also worry about the dc being ill. One of mine waited four days for an appointment which was then cancelled last minute and rearranged for another eight days later. They didn't ask if it could wait, they didn't ask what the problem was.

As it was we weren't going to bother going after 12 days as the pain had died down but did just incase. They found something that could have done with checking way earlier than 12 days and that really worries me.

Many people know how strained the NHS is and don't like to make a fuss. By the time they get an appointment they have either given up or are at desperation point and that is dangerous if it turns out to be something serious.

I omitted to say that as well as paying approx 50 pounds per GP visit, we have private health insurance which costs a few hundred annually. To visit a consultant sets us back in the region of 200 pounds per visit and must be referred by a GP who charges 50 pounds to write the referral.

Keremy, where are you? I am away at the moment back Saturday might be able to help.. Message me

Our local a&he has an oncall doctor, you go to the a&e and you get seen by a nurse first of all then moved into a queue to see a doctor away from the emergencies, been there a few times when I've blacked out with my brain condition