NHS piss takers. Selfish, self absorbed people

[ThornsWithin]

Without going into specifics, I work in a clinic and see people by appointment. They have an allocated time slot ranging from 10 minutes to 40 minutes depending on what I’m seeing them for. Since I started this job I’ve become amazed and frustrated with how many people think it’s fine to stroll in late. Sometimes upto 30 minutes late and still expect to be seen. Once they’re 10 minutes late we can mark them as non attenders but half the time, they stroll in after that time and get at the receptionists about how they “must” be seen - the receptionists then come to us panicking and we end up seeing them to keep the peace. These people don’t give a shit that their behaviour puts the clinic way behind, makes other people’s waiting times much longer, causes staff to be off late ... and half the time they don’t even have an excuse for being late! We get “sorry, I forgot” or “sorry, I got talking in the shop” or even “sorry, I didn’t want to get up this morning! Hehe”

It’s a joke. What makes it even worse is when they stroll in late, check in and then bugger off to go to toilet or get a drink! You’re already 20 minutes late ffs! At least get a shift on once you’re here!!

AIBU to literally refuse to see people once their 10 minutes late thing is up? It would make me unpopular with both patients and staff but I’m sick of the piss taking. I’m sick of getting home late because people can’t be arsed to turn up on time.

I wouldn’t dream of strolling into an appointment 10 minutes late, why do people think this is ok??

Or should I be more tolerant?

Btw the clinic is not mental health related or urgent care.

@fuma
We weren't having any kind of discussion. You want me to explain something you could work out for yourself if you had the wherewithal to comprehend it. If you think that fixed costs make things free I doubt whether anybody can explain anything to you.

Are you in a position to raise with your commissioners? With the drive for improvement and efficiency within the NHS is be surprised if they didn't support you maintaining a reasonable time policy.

I'm going to play devil's advocate and say that doctors, dentists, etc, should also run on time, should keep waiting patients updated on unavoidable delays & apologise when it happens.

I now ask when I arrive for appointments if the clinic is running on time and if it is late, how late. That way I know straight away if there is likely to be delays and can start working on contingency plans if I am kept late.

So many times my dentist has walked in half an hour late to start the day, same when I was pregnant & got 8am appointments and the obstetrician would arrive late, then have a long chat with other staff while fuming patients sat in the waiting room.

These kind of things infuriate me. I have to see a consultant in another area because no hospitals in my county cover the specialism. I always ask for the first appointment of afternoon surgery at 1pm as it takes 2.5 hrs to travel to the hospital. So many times I have arrived at 12.30, walked into the empty waiting room, booked in with the receptionist and still sat there for 2 hours before being seen. In those 2 hrs the room has just filled up further and I've even heard people arrive 10/15 minutes late, apologising due to traffic delays and be told off by the receptionist for being late despite the entire clinic running 2hrs late and the consultant hasn't even turned up yet!

I also had to go to my local hospital for a referral. Had an appointment at 3pm, turned up and checked in at 2.45pm, was called in by a nurse at 3.20pm for the basic height/weight/blood pressure checks and was then taken to sit outside the consultation room and told I was next after the current patient. At 3.35pm the patient before me left the room so I assumed it would be a 5/10 minute wait as they did a changeover between appointments. At 4.10pm the nurse who had brought me through saw me still waiting and immediately went to knock on the consultation room door and when she let herself in, I could hear the consultant and another nurse just having a chat about their social lives until they were told I was still waiting. The worst part is that I left the hospital an hour and a half after my appointment time and was surprised it was "only" an hour delay because usually its double that.

I got frustrated when waiting at a haematology clinic. I had been there two hours, when they said, they'll see you now. I pointed out that that was a waste of time as I needed blood to be drawn and my platelets counted; as I didn't think that talking about my platelet count without knowing what it was, was a waste of my time and effort.

I had said when I was being weighed by the nurse that I needed blood to be taken...she snapped back that I would be told when it could be done...if she had to stay late, then I don't give a shit.

The above was in the NHS. By contrast, in Belgium, I am given a time to have blood taken, then told to go away for an hour whilst it's analysed, then given a time from which I will be seen by a junior doc (training hospital).. It always runs roughly to time.

We live 25 mile a from the hospital so I deliberately book the final appt of the day so we can go after college. To be faced with a waiting room full of teens in joggers who were booked in earlier but didn’t bother turning up til 4.30pm. So we have to wait. So annoying when those of us who love furthest away and have jobs and school to worry about have turned up on time.

I've got a disabled child so we do LOTS of appointments and 9/10 times I just sit there and think about how much extra this is costing me in car parking ....just because a clinic is running late! Sometimes its hours.....trying to keep a severely disabled child occupied in these spaces is horrendous !

I hate to say this Monkeywhale but after 6yrs I have noted that younger patients are sadly and often the ones who are dramatic in order to be seen quicker whilst the elderly patients are far more patient. I’ve lost count of the ones who come in with their coffee, paper and lunch to complain they are in agony and we are treating them like dogs. Have you taken pain relief madam? No why should I it’s your job! So we take pain relief to her and she actually told us we had to feed it to her because her arm was bad....still drinking her Starbucks. This sort of behaviour is no longer uncommon.

I agree OP. It's very disrespectful not to be on time without a good reason. I was once late for an appointment because my bis broke down and it then took me shes to get a taxi ( the next 2 buses were full) but I phoned ahead and they kindly shifted things round so I could still be seen.

It works both ways though. We once had to take ds for an appointment at 8.45am and when we arrived we were told the clinic was cancelled and that they'd written to us.. ok these things happen. Except 2 days later we got the letter.. dated the day of the appointment!!

I work in a hospital where I work as part of a team which dispenses injections for patients in clinic.

Some of us have to start at 06.30, (after cleaning and preparing the clean room the day before), the pharmacy team start at 07.00 and once the syringes are clear of the clean rooms, a couple of us have to run around to the clinic to deliver them.

The clinic has housekeepers, porters, receptionists, CSWs, nurses, more pharmacy technicians, specialist scientists, radiographers, dieticians, physiotherapists and other health professionals who all have to prepare clinic rooms, beds and waiting areas.

Part of the preparation are phone calls to patients to remind them of their appointments, see if they're still coming, if they need another time or day and a reminder that there are other patients who require the appointment slot if they can't attend.

Every assurance that they'll attend, puts another patient back.

A DNA (Did Not Attend) costs thousands of £££££ and prevents another patient being called in.

Six DNAs in a week is a full clinic day.

Serial DNAers get three chances and then they're dropped from the clinic, regardless of what their GP or consultant says.

It's morale sapping, it affects the diagnosis and treatment of other patients and it's entitled behaviour.

I have an autoimmune disorder, so spend a lot of time at my local hospital. And honestly, it’s a nightmare. The parking situation is far from adequate, the clinics never run on time (or even start on time- how do doctors get away with being 45 minutes late when they have patients waiting?), the signposting in the hospital is confusing (at best!) It’s easy to see why people who aren’t used to it could accidentally end up being late.

For the record, for my last clinic appointment I left home 1 hour before my appointment time- I live a 15 minute drive from the hospital and thought I’d grab a coffee when I got there. I ended up calling the receptionist from the car park queue 5 minutes before my appointment, having sat in said queue for more than half an hour. She cancelled my appointment so I had to turn around and head home. Not sure that can be unique to me, or that I could be to blame for that situation

I think people are not considering the consequences of arriving late because they have been kept waiting long past their appointment time in the past. Perhaps not seeing the irony that they were kept waiting because so many people were late. It becomes a vicious circle though.

But why don't clinics start on time? What prevents good communication?

I always get a taxi to our local hospital. The parking is so expensive and the spaces so few that I don’t find it worth the hassle. It’s about £15 for the round trip.
I always get a taxi at least an hour before my appointment time and go for a coffee when I get there.
Can’t think as I have ever been late for anything in my life tbh.

I did experience an emergency room in LA once when my face swelled up with an abscess. I was in and out in twenty minutes with a prescription for antibiotics and painkillers. It was brilliant and I think I commented to dh at the time that I’d happily pay for an A&E service like that in the uk

I always get a taxi to our local hospital

But our local hospital has had so many services closed that we now have to travel long distances to get treatment.

I got a taxi home after an inpatient stay and it cost me £50 for one way. I can't afford £100 round trip at least twice per month and often more so I have to go on the tube and face the delays.

A taxi to my local hospital is about £14 for a round trip (it’s a very short drive). In a few years the A&E there is closing and a cab will be £40 return and take 30 mins each way (and you can more than double that for people in some areas of the county).

Last week DT2 had 3 hospital appointments - even if I could leave his twin with DH and then lug one car seat around while wrangling an autistic toddler, that would be £64 in cab fares in one week. It’s just not feasible. I also can’t hang around a hospital for an hour before an appointment, when clinics are often running an hour late. I always try to make sure we are early but there’s only so much contingency you can build in. And when clinics run so behind there’s only so much time people can get off. It’s one thing if you have a hospital appointment once in a blue moon but if it’s frequent it’s a big problem.

Patients need to be more careful not to miss appointments but hospitals also need to ensure they have adequate infrastructure to enable patients to be on time.

I also hate how clinics are always late. I always tend to be early apart from last time with the bus missap. It's not unusual to be hour late. And if you're working etc you can't take hours and hours off to just sit in a waiting room! My Dr was late once by 45mins. Ok, it happens. In walks a guy in bike gear. 5mins later guy calls my name. He's the locum Dr and very clearly late because he rose in to work. Either way, hd wasn't late due to appointments. He was late because he failed to get to work on time. This was 8am so no housecalls etc before

It's a 25 minute drive each way to hospital and there are no buses from where we live or trains that go sensibly nearby. You could get a train and a bus but it would take about three times as long. Taxis would be at least £20 each way.

I had all my antinatal appointments at the hospital with a consultant. I used to book the first appointment of the day, 8:30, and get a coffee and paper on my way. The consultant didn't arrive until 9am, and I would go in around 9:15, having had my drink and read.

The consultant didn't change his arrival time, and the receptionist was unable to amend the clinic start time. By the afternoon, clinic would be hours behind and the waiting room would be full, with pregnant women having to sit on the floor (I kid you not, but maybe that's a different issue).

I regularly have to go to haematology and my son attends a pediatric clinic, at both I'm able to rebook the next one whilst there and I always get the first of the day.

If you're late at my GPs surgery, you have to wait until the last person is seen or if there's a cancellation.

I do agree with you, OP. It is inconsiderate of people to be late without a very good reason.

Tomorrow I will be asking to leave work about 15 minutes early in order to get to my diabetes clinic appointment on time. It won't be a problem.

However, as others have said, sometimes it does cut both ways. I have been let down by NHS hospital administration before and not received an appointment letter until several days AFTER I was supposed to have attended the appointment. The postmark and date on the letter also confirmed this but I still had to stand my ground to get them to remove the DNA (did not attend) from my record. I cannot attend an appointment I did not know I had. This has also happened to my mother (different hospital and area) and to a friend of mine too.

So largely I do agree with you, but just occasionally things go wrong and it can be frustrating for all.

YANBU. It is rude to be late for an appointment unless you have a valid reason and have called ahead. I hate being late and I hate people who are routinely late or just don't care like the examples you have highlighted.
Do you have managerial support in declining people who are more than 10 mins late?

YABU - I don’t think I’ve ever been seen remotely on time for an appointment on the NHS. Can’t expect everyone to wait around for you but refuse to be flexible yourself. You have no idea why they are late. If you can see them, you should

@ThornsWithin

YANBU

@ThornsWithin

YANBU.

Me and DH have had quite a few clinic/hospital appointments this past year or so, and we ALWAYS turn up 20-30 minutes early. We live very rural, and each appointment is 20 to 30 miles away, and so we have to allow an hour (even though it technically takes 30-35 minutes,) in case of roadworks, traffic jams, Sunday drivers, caravans, horseboxes, cyclists, and tractors etc.

When we DO turn up, we actually say 'sorry for being so early, and we are fine with waiting. It's not your fault that we're 25 minutes early!'

On quite a few occasions, the receptionist has said 'hey don't apologise! At least you are here. Some people don't turn up. And many people are late.' Upshot is that people coming EARLY is quite rare.

Then we sit down, and expect a wait. Quite a few times we have been called in early (10 to 15 minutes before the appointment,) although we don't expect it.

As the OP said, if Mrs Jones has an appointment at 10.00am, and Mr Smith has one at 10.15am, and Mr Smith comes in at 10.08am (and Mrs Jones has not yet arrived for her 10.00am appointment,) Mr Smith will be seen early.

If Mrs Jones rocks up at 10.17am (17 minutes after her due time,) and Mr Smith is still in his appointment, Mrs Jones can wait til he has been seen. Yeah Mrs Jones's appointment was first, but as she couldn't manage to arrive on time, she gets pushed back.