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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think that doctors sit and wait system is a joke.

118 replies

CAK111512 · 03/09/2019 09:10

My son is quite poorly and needs to see a doctor. He has autism and cannot tell me whats hurting or in pain.

Doctors reception opens at 8.30. I actually manage to get through at 8.33 but all the appointments were gone but they could offer me the sit and wait appointments.

All the appointments gone by 8.33??

I asked How long she’d think it would be and said she couldn’t say but if my son was in distress they could offer another room for him. Which I am grateful for but to think it’s a joke that you can’t get a proper app at 8.33??

They are building more and more houses where I live and it’s becoming such a pressure on our local resources!

OP posts:

Bouffalant · 03/09/2019 10:47

I think that's pretty good to be honest! 1.5hr wait for a same day appointment on demand - do people really consider that to be bad?

nokidshere · 03/09/2019 10:56

If the receptionist had told you there was an appointment available in 1.5 or even 3 hours you would have been happy because it was a same day appointment.

There's no difference really except you don't know the actual time you will get to see the doc. You never know, it might be sooner rather than later if others can't be bothered to sit and wait.

CGTER567 · 03/09/2019 10:56

No pre book is ridiculous. My surgery allows pre booking still, thankfully.
It means they leave x amount of appointments open for on the day urgent things and everybody is (mostly) happy. I would not be pleased if they changed to this same day nonsense.

LaMarschallin · 03/09/2019 11:09

There just aren't enough doctors to meet demand.
It's not the doctors' fault.
There are 24 hours in a day.
Say, they work 12 (giving them time to sleep and see their own families/friends). Often hospital doctors work more.

Out of those 12, take some time for paperwork and visits.
And possibly going to the toilet and having lunch.

If you then divide that by, say, 10 minutes per consultation (10 mins is never enough, is it?)...
Then look at how many patients want appointments in a given time.
I'm sure you can work it out.

Money needs to be found from somewhere for more doctors or someone needs to invent a time machine.

Dontsweatthelittlestuff · 03/09/2019 11:12

My gps surgery is pre book plus urgent appointments in the afternoon but to get an urgent appointment you have to ring at 8 o’clock and they are gone within 20 minutes. You can ring everyday for a week and still not get one or even sent to another surgery miles away to be fitted in.
A non urgent appointment you will be told what day to ring when the next block of appointments are being released. The appointments will be 2 weeks away and again you have to ring at 8 o’clock in the day of release to get one. By mid morning they will be gone and you have to wait for the next block to be released.
I would love for them to go over to a sit and wait system. Maybe then they would have a sign up each month with the number of appointments missed which never falls under 70 and often over 100.

SouthWestmom · 03/09/2019 11:21

Ours has pre bookable for about two weeks ahead (pm) and sit and wait in the morning. Queue of pensioners from 8am, doors open 8.30am, names taken and then GPs see people from 9. Usually if you turn up at 9.30 it's 2.5 hours waiting. Which is a pita in the same room and v different to being told to come in in 2.5 hours.

PumpkinP · 03/09/2019 11:24

An hour?! I don’t think that’s bad, I regularly have to wait 2 hours at my local gp. There standard wait time is 2 hours.

cranstonmanor · 03/09/2019 11:38

What do you suggest they do OP? Raise income tax 10% so they can hire more doctors? Cancel someone elses much needed appointment so your son doesn't have difficulty waiting? What is your suggestion here?

RavenLG · 03/09/2019 11:45

The wait and see option is the only option available at my drs. There is online booking but there is never any appointments available and I've tried 10 or so times in the 2 years I'v been at this drs to get an advanced appointment and never been able to get one. And the 'wait and see' option is only available from 8am - 10.30am so hardly anyone get's seen.

I had to be referred to another gp practice for an implant removal (other gp practice is actually in the same building as my gps!) but it took 3 month. By this time it was long past effective imo, but speaking to the doctor she said people that are not turning up to appointments is the killer for GPs / NHS at the moment. The day I went in she said was the first day in 3 weeks where everyone turned up, and if we charged for every single missed appointment in that year it could fund 3000 GPs. Madness.

ElizaDee · 03/09/2019 11:45

A while ago. I took DD to one of those systems and we were waiting for 1.5 hours

It once took 3 months of ringing every morning for me to get an appointment, so a wait in the surgery of 1.5hrs to be seen that day doesn't seem too bad to me.

notso · 03/09/2019 11:46

I cannot get an appointment at my doctors. I've been triaged as non-urgent so have to book a non-urgent appointment but there are none to book.
I've been phoning twice a week for 7 weeks.

arethereanyleftatall · 03/09/2019 11:47

So, you get to see a doctor on the same day you call, and that isn't good enough?!? I'd say that's awesome. For goodness sake, we need to lower our expectations.
Carthage's post up thread is good. People seem to simultaneously want to pay less tax (and fiddle the system wherever possible), and expect so so much.

PookieDo · 03/09/2019 11:48

Would you like me to explain?

X surgery has X GP’s per patient. Probably not enough because they are not always easy to recruit. So already, demand will outstrip supply and if you have everyone trying to call in from 8.30am, many people would never get through or get an appointment at all

A bookable clinic allocates 10 mins or even 7 per patient, fitting in perhaps 24 odd patients (this is with no breaks) per ‘session’

The GP’s also have a lot of paperwork to do such as referrals, signing prescriptions and attending (important, clinical) meetings which unfortunately mean slots have to be removed for this - there are only so many hours in a day)

There are X amount of prebookable slots on a day vs slots given to patients in advance (perhaps for follow up reasons). If you release them all too quickly, they will all be gone straight away. You release them in stages. But when they are gone, they are gone

You can’t go more than 4 weeks in advance for clinics because they are an absolute minefield to build in with clinicians who all work different days and hours and no one wants to have to cancel a whole clinic that was booked 6 weeks ago and now has to change

In the sit and wait there are usually 2 doctors if not more. They will not only be dealing with the sit and wait but all the home visits and telephone calls. But this releases pressure on the telephones

All of the overflow then are seen on the day. Which is an appointment. With a doctor. On the same day.

PookieDo · 03/09/2019 11:52

I feel for people who do not have sit and wait to be honest with you. Waiting 7 weeks is awful. Whereas you can be seen on the same day you check in at reception. I don’t see the issue sorry

Sleepyblueocean · 03/09/2019 11:56

If your son is not able to wait without getting distressed he should be jumped to the front of the queue of the sit and wait.
If Ds needs to be seen he is always seen the same day and usually goes in pretty much straight away because they know what is likely to happen if he doesn't.

Kazzyhoward · 03/09/2019 11:57

Money needs to be found from somewhere for more doctors

But doctors are refusing to work full time and extra shifts because of the tax penalties of losing the personal allowance when they earn over £100k and having a tax bill when their pension funds breach the lifetime allowance limits. So until the tax system is changed, however much money is made available, the GPs will continue to work fewer and fewer hours.

Wherearemycrayons · 03/09/2019 11:57

Go to America, start paying for your healthcare and then realise what you’re moaning about here OP.
YABU

Kazzyhoward · 03/09/2019 11:58

Our GP surgery used to be brilliant before it merged with others to make a "super" practice. In the mornings it was sit and wait, in the afternoons it was appointments - best of both worlds and covered all needs.

LaMarschallin · 03/09/2019 12:08

And sometimes patients ask for emergency appointments for the wrong reasons.
This not blaming them.

But, for example (and obviously changing the details a bit so as not to be outing for the lady involved), a lady living me is getting a bit muddled (possibly early dementia but no diagnosis; it may just be increasing anxiety).

On three occasions, to my knowledge, she has gone and sat in the GP's waiting room for an emergency appointment when it wasn't an emergency.

Once, for example, she'd fallen and cut her head on a weekend away. She was told to make an appointment for a week or so with her GP to have the stitches out.
On the Monday (the day after the incident) she woke up and thought she needed the stitches out that day. Despite the written advice she had. So sat in the GP's waiting room for 2 hours to be told that she'd need to make an appointment for a week or so...etc

Not her fault, but it took the time needed to check the wound and reassure her. Which eats into the time available.

ColdTattyWaitingForSummer · 03/09/2019 12:12

I would love if my surgery had a sit and wait option! We have very limited advance appointments (usually only if the doctor says come back in a week or whatever) and otherwise it’s call on the day. I’ve dialled over 100 times trying to get through before, and when you do all the apps are gone, and you just have to try again tomorrow. I wish I could sit and wait, knowing that even if it was an hour or so I’d definitely see someone. (Although I do appreciate that the asd makes that harder in your case.)

LaMarschallin · 03/09/2019 12:16

@Kazzyhoward

Money needs to be found from somewhere for more doctors

Well, as long as it's legal, and unless and until the tax system changes, some will.
And if medicine is made even less appealing as a career, there may be even still fewer doctors.

Wouldn't most people choose to work fewer hours for more money if they could?

Or are doctors supposed to be "different" in some way?

insancerre · 03/09/2019 12:17

I love my gp surgery
You can ring in the morning tell them it’s urgent and be seen within hours
My dd rang with pretty bad depression and they saw her that day and gave her an appointment when her dad was available to take her
My gp works alone from a bungalow
His wife is the practice nurse

Stravapalava · 03/09/2019 12:17

My surgery does sit & wait for new issues, but there's no phoning. You just turn up at 8.30 and you get triaged & seen in order of urgency. Routine appointments are in the afternoons. I've never had a problem with either of the sit & wait or getting a routine appointment. It's better as well as it frees up the phone line. Do you not get triaged if you turn up?

Amanduh · 03/09/2019 12:18

You can ring and go along and see GP with about an hours wait, free, on the day you need it? How the hell can anyone say that isn’t acceptable? It’s bloody marvellous that we even have the option!

BogglesGoggles · 03/09/2019 12:18

This has been my experience of NHS services everywhere. I try to go private when possible (no private god where I live anymore unfortunately). I love Britain but the healthcare system here makes me really home sick.

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