About the doctors and my 4yr old dd

[pinkiepie1]

DD has had a high temperature for the past 2 days, then started vomiting and was sleepy. No rash or anything as I checked. Calpol worked for 2hrs then temp would come back.

I rang 111 and they gave me a call back at 2 this morning, as her temperature had gone down slightly and she was asleep to leave her until the morning and get her in to see GP. The nurse who I spoke to also put a note in her file saying she needs to be seen in 24hrs by a gp.

I rang the doctors at 8 and I explained everything and about the note saying she needed to be seen, but all I got was someone will call you back.

Is this the norm now? I just don't know. i went to argue but she cut me off saying, thanks, bye, before I could say anything else.

Sorry, we Cross posted.

That's normal now. Well it is at my surgery. The receptionist makes a note of the problem,then a doctor rings back and discusses it with you and will.tell you to come in if it's urgent. They will give you.a time
That's what happened to me yesterday.
I phoned at 8.45 the doctor phoned back around 9.15 and decided I needed to come in and gave me an appointment for 9.40

you ring a receptionist but they can't give you an appointment so a doctor then rings you back

Er it doesn't happen every time

OP, I'm clueless but curious, what's a water infection ("water and throat infection")?

He's diagnosed a poorly child over the phone??? And prescribed antibiotics? Is it only me who thinks that's very wrong?

I actually think it's a good system - the receptionists at our old GP were fantastic - sometimes we had callbacks, sometimes they booked appointments (depending on when I called and what was available - I got an appointment just before closing more than once for emergencies - and blue lit from the surgery for one, while they held my car-keys so my MIL/FIL could move it from their carpark later) - triage really makes a difference. Yes, don't be fobbed off, but no, don't kick up a fuss now when they're working on a good system.

Er it doesn't happen every time

It depends on the surgery. You can't book doctors/ nurse practitioner appointments at ours at all through reception. You can book ones with nurse only.

He's diagnosed a poorly child over the phone??? And prescribed antibiotics? Is it only me who thinks that's very wrong?

Yes I do find that odd. My Dr has had the system of phoning you if you require a same day appointment for over 15 years. The only time she has prescribed ABs without seeing DD was when she was going through a phase of tonsillitis and I knew what it was.

However the OP has to take a unrine sample in, so if it isn't an infection, I'm sure the OP will phone the Dr back up!

OP it sounds like the on-call doctor will call you back to discuss symptoms etc and then (more than likely) will bring you in for an appointment at some point in the day.

It does vary a lot between GP surgeries- at mine you have to call at the stroke of 8am to get "on the day" appointments. Have always managed to get an appointment for myself or LO.

Er, yes, in some practices it does. It's often called Doctor First

My response was to the point about whether receptionists were needed. I meant that a doctor doesn't ring you back every time - of course they don't. What I meant was that you do actually need receptionists.

Bear in mind that in most surgeries receptionists do a lot more than just book appointments. They may be giving out test results, calling people in for routine matters like childhood vaccines etc, chasing up hospital correspondence, dealing with requests for and issuing repeat prescriptions, and so on.

So in these triage systems they may just hand details to a dr/nurse practitioner if someone asks for an appointment. They may instead call 999 for the patient if appropriate, or they may redirect them to the health visitor/dental access centre etc. But all the other myriad reasons that people ring their GP surgery will be dealt with by the receptionist.

My practice uses call backs and it's always worked effectively for our needs.

My last one was for persistent diahrrea that was neither resolving after being left to flush through, nor responding to several days of Imodium which I tried after and I reached the stage where I needed more personal advice. The doctor arranged for a sample test, so I only had to go into the practice briefly to pick up/ drop off the sample minimising time hanging around spreading the infection. Although it did finally resolve itself, a notifiable bacteria was identified and a Health England questionnaire was sent out. So it was worthwhile contacting the surgery, but seeing the GP face to face wasn't essential.

Other times we've been fitted in with the nurse and she's issued a prescription for mild infections just requiring 30 seconds of the GPs time to check and authorise it. Sometimes we've had a same day appointment allocated.

I've always felt that we've received an appropriate level of medical support, and haven't had to play the 8:00-8:01 race to get the only appointments for the day game multiple days in a row that so many people have to endure.

Yes, most NHS GPs are hopelessly overstretched these days. There are private clinics inmost towns.

Glad to hear you heard back from them and it all worked well, hope DD gets better soon.

I've had it where I've phoned up and they got a GP to call me back and the GP decided it would be best to do a home visit. I imagine the receptionist can decide whether it is something which needs to be seen (swollen finger) or talked about on the phone. So much more responsive and efficient than always having to make an appointment and especially when you can't physically make it.

At my surgery if you call for an emergency appointment you have to take the next available slot -even if you live too far away to get there in time! I explained this to the receptionist once and she said her only other option was to get a GP to call me -which they did and arranged a more suitable time!

I like the doctor phoning me back, particularly if I have a child like yours that I'd rather not drag along to the surgery feeling terrible. In fact I more often ask for a phone consultation than a face to face appointment now.
If they do feel they need to see me/the dc then they usually say bring them down straight away and see them pretty quickly.

Sorry was at the chemist.
Water infection I mean uti. I take it just to check it, send it off to the lab.
She definitely has tonsillitis, white blobs (can't think of what to call them) covering her tonsils.
It was a lot easier doing it over the phone because getting her up and dressed would have been a struggle.
I did think it was a little strange prescribing antibiotics over the phone, I guess that's just the way my doctors work. I'll try anything to make her feel better.

Pinkie, good that you are closer to knowing what's wrong and getting your DD better.
I'm really not trying to be critical I have just never heard this in reference to a person before - this "water" thing. I appreciate you explaining that "water" means "urinary tract". Earlier up in this thread you also mentioned a "water sample" so I think you meant urine sample? Why say water when you don't mean water? I think my DGM said water when she meant her dogs needed to go outside to urinate (eg "go do your water") but she was massively old and that was a very long time ago. Urine isn't actually water. How long has this "water" instead of "urine" been a thing and I've not known? Is it to be polite? Pls someone educate me this is so strange to me.