GP Surgery experience

[JoMos]

I'm not just ranting here ... I'm asking AIBU - but I'm also asking if this experience is typical of others and if this is common across GP surgerys and around the country.....

So until recently I hadn't been to the drs for ages. Recently I've needed to go a few times and have physiotherapy (all concerned).

I was going on holiday the day after a physio appointment and I had some changes / new symptoms and my physio said I should just discuss them with a Dr before traveling ideally. So I went into the Drs at about 11am and explained this to the receptionist. I wasn't asking to see a Dr there and then I was asking if I could have a quick chat with one at any point even on the phone if someone could call me back either that day or of I could be seen or even talk on the phone the next morning before I went. Whilst still in mid sentence the the receptionist pursed her lips and started shaking her hair from side to side. It was, apparently, simply impossible. I went home and called the surgery in the hope I got a different receptionist. I did - explained the same thing and a Dr called me back about an hour and half later.

This amazed me. Obviously it was possible to talk to a Dr on the phone that day because I did. The receptionist just decided that she was making the decision that I couldn't - despite knowing that another medical professional (my physio) has advised it necessary. Without being dramatic, I don't know how she can sleep at night. What I mean is that I would never - with no medical training or knowledge whatsoever - decide someone couldn't talk to a Dr when they have been advised to do so.

I have since discovered other people have had terrible experiences with the receptionists at this practice. The odd thing is the Drs are all great I don't know why the receptionists are allowed to behave this way - because as I say I since realised this is not an isolated incident.

Is this normal / common / AIBU?
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They do have triage training these days YABU.

The things is thought, she didn't ask me anything about my issue or reason for needing to see the Dr. So she couldn't have triaged me even if she has been on 'training days' because she had no information. The only information she did have is that my physiotherapist had advised it necessary.

Also, I really do hope receptionists are not triaging - I mean if you go to A&E etc a nurse will triage. I don't think many people would like it if receptionists are doing the triage 🤔

It's not triage training - that has a specific meaning in medical world I think.

It's call handling training, with a smattering of red flag words.

I can see why you'd be a bit irritated by that although perhaps someone had cancelled or the latter receptionist just went particularly out of her way to have you fitted in.

I do think it varies with GP receptionist. I've never met one who was unprofessional but I have met some who will go a bit more above and beyond than others.

If the physio had thought it that urgent she/he would have sent you to the hospital. You don't know what other patients were in line to see the GP, what they had wrong with them and what changed between the initial conversation you had with the receptionist and the later one on the phone. Yet your assumption is that the receptionist is wrong/stupid/has "no medical training whatsoever" and should be unable to sleep at night as a result of her "behaviour"

Sexist for a start. Showing no appreciation of her role and the constraints she is working under and simply entitled.

You may be disappointed since you felt you "needed" to be seen that day before your holiday - fair enough - but don't blame a woman who is likely working under pressure for low pay.

If it was that serious you could have delayed your holiday for a day - it clearly wasn't life and death.

YANBU. There's one at every doctor's surgery. They see it as a personal defeat if they let someone through and give them an appointment. There's that joke about it taking seven years to become a doctor but 15 minutes of training for a doctor's receptionist to think they are one.
There's a couple at my doctors' that are just lovely generally do do everything in their power to assist. There's one, though, that is just awful and dreadfully unhelpful. She really shouldn't be in a public-facing role.

HowardSpring - actually, you make some very valid points. My annoyance was amplified by the fact I had been anxious about it which made me more irritable at the time. And in the spirit of honesty and fairness - I didn't consider postponing getting to Tenerife (lol). I think one thing that irritated me was how generally miserable she was when she was talking me to I tend to have a low tolerance for that.

But yes, some very valid points. The only one I can take issue with is sexist ..... I would have been equally disgruntled if it has been a male receptionist. Gender didn't make any difference.

Ohtherewearethen - thank you! 😁 ..... Yes, this is what I'm hearing from some others too ! Seems to be the luck of the draw! And the joke made me laugh 😂

Thank you for acknowledging that -I was probably a bit hard on you but I see it so often.

The sexist comment was because it is more often than not women who get the sort of jobs that leave them in a position with the appearance of authority, a lot of responsibility but no real decision making power. It is classic sexism to blame the mother but not the father, the MIL but not her son (DH), the receptionist, (usually female) but not the Dr (often male), the checkout operator but not the store manager.

(I have been spending a lot of time with my uni student DD recently - she pulls me up on everything and is usually right)

Anyway - hope you do get better and enjoy Tenerife

4 weeks wait for an appointment at our GP for non urgent. For urgent you have to call by 9- they call you back and let you know if you can have an appointment. If non-urgent you have to check for a cancellation or be first in the queue to book when they are released 28 day in advance.

Just checked now and the first available appointment is 16th May- there are 8 available appointments in total that week for a practice with 13500 registered patients.

So why should someone expect to turn up and queue hop.

To be honest expecting to get seen/spoken to in one day for a non-urgent issue to fit around your holiday comes across as fairly entitled.

I'd expect you to be grateful that the second receptionist managed to help you rather than pissed off that the first one couldn't. You've no idea what may have changed in the Dr's schedule etc to make it possible.

Without being dramatic, I don't know how she can sleep at night.

This is very, very dramatic...

I agree that this sounds very annoying but to be fair, you don’t know what the policies are or whether the later receptionist was aware of a cancellation or any other reason. It sounds more like a miscommunication than a case of a tyrannical arsehole trying to ruin your life.

Sometimes people get things wrong or make mistakes or give bad service. It’s annoying, but it’s not a sign that they’re evil bastards out to get us.

If I call my surgery I am always told to phone in the morning. If I call in the morning the phones are always engaged, often taken off the hook on purpose.

I can make an online appointment in 3 - 4 weeks if I am lucky, or I can complete a form for a non urgent phone call. I usually take this option because if the GP considers it important I will be given an appointment the same or next day. Presumably they keep some free for such things.

Often there will be a receptionist that should not be allowed near sick people, offhand, rude, unhelpful and obstructive and those are the ones that answer the phone. Then there is the foul woman that giggles and smirks when you ask for a sample bottle.

Sometimes calling in because the phones are out of order (again) and waiting for test results will get me a phone call from a GP which results in a return trip later in the day, that is if I am lucky and get a human receptionist the first time round.

It isn't a case of queue jumping, it is a case of allowing the GP to decide if the symptoms are important enough to consider treatment.

I have experienced receptionists asserting that something is not possible without hearing the full circumstances.

For me, what she was refusing to do was something that had already been agreed previously, and if she'd let me explain properly, she'd have known to go and check with her boss who had agreed it with me as a special exemption from the usual policy for genuine clinical reasons. But no, she knew better.

It is not their fault, but it is rather confusing for the patients when "what is possible" changes daily, or in relation to who you speak to.

I’m a GP. We have 10000 patients on our list, and 5 doctors. Every patient thinks their problem only needs a moment, and surely the doctor must be able to find a minute to call them that day.

But the volume of work generated by 10000 patients is just too vast to give everyone what they want in a timely manner.

We spend many meetings discussing and trialling alternative appointment regimes, but nothing works. I would be very happy to hear of any suggestions.

And don’t say “more doctors”, because firstly we don’t have enough rooms for more doctors in out building, and secondly there aren’t enough doctors wanting to be GPs anyway.

And we aren’t allowed to turn people away if they want to join our list. Housing estates and care homes are being built constantly, and we just have to keep on accepting more patients.

What is the solution?

@mintychoc my GP surgery is currently touring their success with an online method of submitting queries like the OP's - you go onto the practice website, fill in a bit about your problem, and someone will do something about it, or call you back, or ask you to make a face to face appointment (depending on what it was you were asking about, I suppose). Sadly I've never used it myself so I can't really comment on it.

choetted the problem I see with that system will be that firstly someone has to go through the emails, secondly people who aren’t online will complain, and thirdly they probably don’t have any appointments to offer if someone does need seeing!

The idea of training receptionists in “signposting” is to stop GP appointments being given for unnecessary things eg wanting paracetamol for arthritis, wanting to know how long it might be before the hosptial appt comes through etc. But the problem remains that if a GP appt is needed for a genuine reason, there just aren’t enough to give out. Because there are too many patients and not enough doctors. And because GPs are having to spend too much time ticking boxes and dealing with issues that used to be sorted in hospital. Successive governments promise to reduce bureaucracy, but without exception they add to it.

And they keep on building houses and bringing more people in to our area.

The maths just doesn’t work, and it never will.

Thank you to all for replies, including those in agreement with me and those not, who made valid points. I should say, I probably expressed myself badly in that it perhaps seemed I was hacked off at not being able to speak to someone quickly enough for my liking and therefore seeming entitled. I was more hacked off at the delivery - the particular receptionist was very miserable and sullen. Had the delivery been different I wouldn't have been hacked off. And the fact I did get to speak to the Dr on the phone later in the day (thanks to the other receptionist) was great!

I was of the mindset 'its just a quick easy thing I need' without perhaps stopping to think that they probably have a queue of people who 'just need to ask one quick question' etc.

However, reading some of the replies here it's the system that's broken I think. The demand is just too massive for the resources available. Practices have far too many paticants to cope with and provide the service they would like to. It's not the fault of the doctors or other staff, who are doing their best in very difficult circumstances. All this talk of 3 to 4 week waits for appointments and never being able to get through on the phone to make an appointment and so on can't be right. Everyone should be entitled to better services than that. How we can make that happen I don't know.

My doctors surgery seems to work very well. You can make appointments online, plus there are on the day appointments for urgent problems, phone at 8:30 for morning appointments or 13:30 for afternoon. Or you can ask for a doctor to call you if you don’t need to go in.
The ability to book online for non urgent appointments, including practice nurse and phlebotomy, is brilliant.

To be honest, it may have been the difference in the way you explained your issue between each conversation with the receptionists. For example, the first receptionist may have taken from your explanation that you just wanted a last minute appointment as you were going on holiday (they probably get loads of these, last minute vaccines etc). Whereas the 2nd receptionist may have taken that another medical professional advised visiting your GP. You had already experienced the 1st conversation with the receptionist so may have subconsciously changed the way you approached the conversation with the 2nd receptionist as a result.