To let you know that you're not doing yourself any favours by refusing to tell the GP receptionist your symptoms?

[privateeyefan]

I'm a GP. My surgery operate a triage system - if you ring up or walk in asking for an appointment, then you get put on the triage list, and get a phone call from the doctor that same day, who can then make an appointment for you if you need one.

When patients ring up or walk in, the receptionists who speak to them will ask for a brief outline of the problem. This means that, as we usually have at least 3 doctors doing triage at any one time, we can prioritise the calls - if if see things that I know will need an appointment, then I will call those patients first so that I can get them into the surgery on the same day, often within the hour.

If you refuse to tell the receptionist what the problem is, and there is therefore nothing next to your name on the triage list, then I leave you until last. I'm not going to prioritise you over people I know will have to be seen, when I have no idea whether or not you will need an appointment. Therefore, if you don't tell the receptionist, your chances of a same-day appointment decrease substantially, and you will also have last choice of appointments over the next few days - the most convenient times after working hours will be long gone.

In addition, I, like most of my colleagues, have a special interest in a certain field. As I glance through the triage list, I generally pick out patients whose problem relates to my particular field of expertise, as do my colleagues. By refusing to give even the briefest of outlines, you rule out the chance that the GP with the most relevant experience will contact you directly.

Receptionists don't have medical training. Of course not. But that doesn't make them incapable of typing a one line summary of your problem dictated by you, in order to help the doctors do their job.

And please also remember - they speak to hundreds of patients daily. Your problem will occupy their mind for a few seconds, and then they will move on to the next patient and you will be swiftly forgotten.

saraclara "surgery phone system begins with a message from one of the doctors, explaining that the caller will need to give a brief description to the receptionist. That would seem like a good idea for your receptionists, OP. people are less likely to be unpleasant to them if they've heard the doctor's voice"

My surgery has one of the admin staff doing it and it is just terrible. She has quite obviously put on her poshest Hyacinth Bucket phone voice - which just comes across as snooty and patronising. And it means she doesn't pronounce things normally either. And then halfway though she was clearly distracted by something as it goes all funny.

There's a reason people pay for professional voiceovers. It is really bad.

Sorry, wrong thread, reported it.

We have had red flag training for signs of sepcis at our surgery. We also have an agreed protocol for dealing with UTIs. None of this is perfect but again in the absence of anyone else at the end of the line, going back to the original point, if you are concerned speak to the person at the end of the phone and give them as much information as you can, it's such a shame that what we do is maligned in the way it is because everyone I work with tries so hard, many of us do have clinical experience and are able to take bloods and test urine samples and are dealing with the nuts and bolts of your health care behind the scenes in a way many of you don't realise. It's simply not fair or correct to be so abusive to people trying to do their job.

One insists you cue in the morning for an appt, I have never been able to get one over the phone. I’m a lawyer and yet you can’t spell queue

being embarrassed about giving a brief reason over the phone while being fine with the prospect of a receptionist reading your detailed record is a bit... daft

No, it isn’t. Verbalising an “embarrassing” problem is difficult for a lot of people. In some demographics, even calling the surgery to ask for an appointment takes a lot of confidence.

Rationally we may think the receptionists don’t care and we shouldn’t be embarrassed, but humans are emotional in ways that aren’t always rational. We aren’t robots.

In the vet practice where I work the computer record system has a function where you can attach a memo that flashes up every time you call up the record. We use this for some of the issues highlighted on this thread so:
Fido scared of men, female vet where poss
Owner prefers to see vet x or y if poss
Owner is teacher/ O is a lawyer, often in court so callbacks difficult.
Owner prefers not to drive in the dark if poss.
It's useful for the new vets as well as receptionists eg
Owner requires detailed written as well as verbal instructions
Previous pet had x issue- O particularly vigilant re this issue
One of our toughest callback people is a lovely chap who works in a quarry and even if he can hear his phone ringing all you can hear is machinery- we got around that one by using his daughter as the point of contact.
Other clients prefer all their contact by email.

Punishing patients for not abiding by your rules...who knows what shit they are dealing with in their own life, they may find it hard to even talk to the doctor about their problem, let alone over the phone or in the surgery.
Also it's fair enough you telling the whole of mumsnet how your triaging works but not every practise works that way.

This system sounds highly inefficient. Patients have to make a call, hang about being available for a call back and then go to the surgery. What an annoyance and waste of their time. Plus leave details of their health problem with a receptionist or risk being discriminated against.

The GP is spending significant time calling patients back and booking appointments which should be a clerical level task. Two different GPs have both had to interact with the patient and listen to what is wrong. How on Earth is this efficient use of GP time?

@Yaflamingalah could have been auto correct.

We have had red flag training for signs of sepcis at our surgery. We also have an agreed protocol for dealing with UTIs

But what if a patient isn't ringing about ?sepsis or a UTI?

How much do you know about other medical conditions or red flags to look out for?

Also, patients don't necessarily know what are worrying symptoms and some symptoms are distracting but aren't cause for concern so patients might focus on them but ignore other more worrying problems. How confident are you of being able to identify this?

Eg, I've been getting an odd sensation in my throat and floor of my mouth. How urgently would I be seen if I phoned to get an appointment for that reason?

I'm in the same position as many on here- GP near home, opens at 8.30; work 45min away, also starts 8.30am and I often work till 7pm or later (my half day off is the same as the GP surgery's half day of...d'oh!)
The callback system is an inconvenience as a PP pointed out- I'm not going to take a full day off work if I might not get an appointment that day; and we aren't really meant to have our phones on our person at work (except to take photos of wounds etc and look up online vet resources).

Still, the way I look at it, there is no spare money to make the NHS more lovely and convenient than it is, so we all have to suck it up and make some sacrifices. GP time is precious and we are paying for it. So if I am expecting a GP call I will bring my phone into consults and warn each client that I may step out to answer it. This is the only non-work thing I would bring my phone into a consult room for. It is "wasting" my professional time and my client's time...but a GP's time is more important than mine and most other people's so I think it's fair that their convenience, and thus maximising their work rate, trumps mine.

But that is effectively penalising me for wanting to exercise that right. So you’re not treating it as a right, but some sort of privilege I shouldn’t really expect to have. Like I say, I understand that, for practical reasons you have little other choice but to run a triage system, but it’s ethically wrong, so you might want to sound a little more understanding?

Absolutely right! Shouldn’t you be ringing people in the order they ring instead of prioritising who you think should be rung first? If you give discriminatory treatment I.e. not ringing back to people who are simply exercising their right not to have to repeat everything twice/speak to a non medical person/tell the receptionist until the very last - you are a discriminator pure and simple. Surely it’s part of your oath to treat everyone requesting medical attention equally and not discriminate?

I dont think I could have found the strength to tell a receptionist I had pnd. I barely managed to tell the doctor in a private room. Thankfully my surgery doesnt require this.

Absolutely right! Shouldn’t you be ringing people in the order they ring instead of prioritising who you think should be rung first? If you give discriminatory treatment I.e. not ringing back to people who are simply exercising their right not to have to repeat everything twice/speak to a non medical person/tell the receptionist until the very last - you are a discriminator pure and simple. Surely it’s part of your oath to treat everyone requesting medical attention equally and not discriminate?

What a ridiculous post. Some medical concerns are more urgent than others. The NHS has limited time and resources. Prioritising is not discriminating.

I understand this but it can be very difficult. I've once burst into tears on a receptionist about a MH problem, I was so scared even to make the appointment, and it felt like going through it twice. I also went through baby loss last year and I tried to make a postnatal check appointment for me and I had no idea whether it would be flagged on the receptionist screen or not, whereas I knew the GP would be aware. The receptionist kept saying the postnatal check was usually at 8 weeks at the same time as the baby one, and eventually I had to blurt out "but my babies died- so what do I do as I still need the postnatal one?!" I had no idea if she knew or not. Things like that are really hard, difficult enough to talk about with the GP, but coming at it cold with a receptionist who is acting a bit as a gatekeeper, when you're feeling vulnerable, can be doubly hard.
So I "get" what you're saying but I think consider why it can be difficult too for some patients. It's not always because patients want to be deliberately arsey or difficult!

HRFT but OP you have come across as a patronising arse. There have been times i have not felt able to discuss extremely personal and upsetting issues with a receptionist. Your lack of empathy is unbelieveable. The lack of confidentiality in the NHS at times is shocking - I hear discussions about people's test results or conditions every time I go to Drs reception - if they are dealing with someone in front of me or on the phone. Sometimes I know the people the receptionists are talking to.

It’s not great when you’re part of a small village practice and you hear the receptionist on the phone “yes Mrs Smith, I can get you in to see the nurse about your piles”. No tact, no privacy.

The level of entitlement on here is astounding.

And not from the doctors

OP keep on doing what you do and try to screen out the noise
It’s a bloody tough job

I have a couple of magnificent examples of the problem. I got a letter about having my coil removed. It arrived 6 months after my hysterectomy so I called to explain that it was an error and could they update my records. As a result of that update I was removed from the Cervical smear list, despite still having a cervix. When I realised, the receptionist refused to make the nurse appointment as she could see I had had a hysterectomy so didn’t need a smear. I had to make an appointment with the GP to amend an error by the receptionist in order to get a nurse appointment that the same receptionsist refused to give me as her “triage” assessment misunderstood my surgery.

As for speaking to the practice manager... I sat in the waiting room once and listened to two receptionists discuss an unusual and rather shocking case in huge detail, including the chaps name. The guy worked in my company and I knew all about his case by virtue of my job but we were keeping it very quiet and it was a very distressing situation. Their public gossip was a huge breach of confidentiality and could have had repercussions for him. I spoke to the practice manager who said she would speak to the staff in question. Afterwards my records were accidentally lost in a system change, appointments were always unavailable for weeks (resulting in some stitches being removed far too late) and I was generally given low level aggravation every time I went near the surgery until that particular receptionist left about 2 years later.

So, all in all, I am not keen on explaining my medical needs to a receptionist for triage purposes as, in my personal experience, they exceed their medical knowledge and authority and they don’t maintain confidentiality.

The OP would probably find it easier to "screen out the noise" if she wasn't airing her complaints about and general disdain for
her patients on a public forum.

In reference to all those who say they don't want to explain their issue to the receptionist. Your are aware that we can see everything the GP writes straight after your consult and it's part of our job to look incase bloods or other tests are linked we need to book you in for. So the receptionist know everything anyway.

My Gp does not allow walk-ins so if your standing in the doctors looking an urgent appt and get asked the reason, it's your own fault because your supposed to use the telephone

Decomposing, you're asking the impossible here. I'm just trying to explain what we do know. And I've already said on a previous post at my surgery it's likely you would be seen on the day if it was a new and acute symptom, you can normally be seen in a week at the outside. The problems can arise when patients will not take the appointment because it's not convenient for them to attend or they don't want to see a particular doctor. We don't have endless appointment possibilities.

I think that it's not too much of a problem over the phone. I also believe that most receptionists are great.
However, where we used to live, we called the receptionist the 'appointment prevention officer'. And we rarely go to the doctor - literally once or twice per year.
The worst experience I had was when I walked up to the receptionist to confirm I'd arrived for my appointment with the nurse. I'd just sat down in the waiting area, next to a whole range of people: old, young, male, female. Madam opened her sliding window and called across the room, 'Is it for a smear?'
I walked up to her window and hissed, 'Why don't we get the nurse to come out here & do it in front of everybody?'
She had the cheek to splutter & protest at what I'd said.