NHS piss takers. Selfish, self absorbed people

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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.

YANBU OP
I hate being late for stuff - especially if I know it impacts other people. Some people just have no empathy.

I was stuck in unexpected traffic the once and was running 5 mins late for the dentist - I called them to explain and said I’d understand if they wanted to cancel. It’s not fair to the staff, or to other people who could have taken that appointment.

I am a Dr and I understand it is frustrating and inconvenient for patients when clinics run late. However, most clinicians don’t run late because we are sitting twiddling our thumbs or because we don’t view your time as important.

There are a variety of reasons why we run late, often out of our control. One reason is that we often do not have long enough with each patient, especially when they have complicated problems. The other is emergencies or late additions to the clinic (happens quite a lot) that need to be seen, or things that become emergencies that have to be dealt with. Add in breaking bad news, being interrupted to answer my bleep (because sometimes there aren’t enough to cover so I have to do clinic and field calls too) and the considerable number of patients turning up late and it’s no wonder we don’t run to time every single day. It would make my life a LOT easier if I never ran late- less stressful, more time for the paperwork to be done afterwards and I might get finished on time/get my full lunch break. I don’t do it to inconvenience patients or out of lack of respect for their time.

Today I was running nearly 40 minutes late. First patient arrived 15 minutes late, had complicated issues which took time to sort out and this meant I was running 20 minutes late by the second patient. This patient took their full allocated time, so still running late. Third patient was receiving some bad, though not unexpected, news and was upset with lots to talk through- needed a little extra time. Patient number 4 was seen nearly 25 minutes late but again was reasonably straight forward so not adding to waiting time, as were patients 5 &6. Patient 7 had an unexpected complication thrown up, but only added an extra minute or so. Next patient was a “squeezed extra”- an emergency squeezed in. This patient received devastating, life-changing news which was totally unexpected and unsurprisingly they were shocked, needed the implications/next steps etc and had lots of questions. By patient 9 I am now running approx 40 minutes late and so it goes for the rest of the clinic. I could have shaved a few minutes off each appointment by rushing through but then patients would (rightly) complain I was rushing and not addressing their problems thoroughly or giving them the time they need.

I do some private work- and I do run late sometimes then too. Less of an issue because I do have longer appointments and there are no “squeezed” appointments for emergencies at the last minute. Very few patients turn up late as there are quite strict rules about when late comers will and will not be seen/ patients still charged if they fail to attend or turn up so late they are not seen which tends to act as a deterrent to turning up late.

Jacks11 I completely sympathize with and support everything you have said in your foregoing post and thank you.

What I don't understand, however, is being sent an apt for 8.30, to sit and watch a clinic fill. To inquire at 9.15 why I haven't been seen and to be barked at by an hca in a uniform that I need to be prepared to see dh

Last time I had a mammo njs staff took it all on bpard.

Folk are probably trying to find somewhere to park....

I can see from both sides.
I'm a CPN so have to see patients by appointment at our base. I get a lot of DNA (did not attend.) If they're particularly vulnerable e.g. people with a psychotic illness often don't attend as they don't think they're ill I'll be proactive about following it up. Others I'll write or contact to rearrange, in case they havent got the appointment. If they dont respond or continue to fail to attend, and i know they're not psychotic, I'll discharge them. But one woman cancelled one, then failed to attend twice more. The two other appointments I'd spoken to her, gave her a new appointment, but was firm that I wasn't sending another letter as she had my details. This would have been followed up by a text message 48 hours before the appointment. I discharged her, but she told the GP i hadnt sent her letters and was referred straight back. I agreed with the GP to give her one last chance, offered another appointment.....and she didn't turn up. Again. Discharged, again.

However the other side is...last year I had an accident and had 13 stitches I my leg. I was off sick two weeks, then back at work, but still needed wound checking. I had an appointment with the nurse at the GP and left work in plenty of time but the trains were down and I was late.i rang on the way to explain but was about 20 minutes late and the nurse refused to see me. I nearly cried. Fortunately the receptionist wassympatheticand slipped me in with another nurse.

I get that spidey66 but I had a 16 year old taking od's and cutting. GP told me about the cutting. First experience with camhs. Pmhw list my numver and didn't respind. Chased. Offered an inaccessible and inappropriate intervention. Asked for alternative and they refused. Wrote to GP saying family had refused services so case closed. At the apt I was told to find help off internet if I was unhappy with wait.

2nd time, dd took 11 antihistamine just before exams (known crisis point). She had a consultsnt psych privately at this stage and had had therapy and waz on fluoxetine. Psych had recently assessed for adhd and asd at dd's request.

DD went to a&e 36 hours afte the anti-histamine to make sure she hadn't harmex herself. Blood tests clear. She was 17. She explained she just wanted reassurance and didn't want me troubled at work.

Was logged as a suicide attempt and after 4 hours I was called. They told me as a protocol she had to stay overnight with a 1:1 mh nurse for an emergencycamhs review. I was also told I'd given permisdion for ss to be informed - I had not, consultant told me I hadn't understood. Funny that. I was called at 5.48. I found out ss were notified at 4.15 later.

DD did not have to stay because at 17 she cd be assessed in a&e by the on-site mh liaison team but the nursing staff and paed consultant weren't aware of that until pressed but had nearly €1000 to spend on an unnecessary admission. Had it been necessary and had I been called dd cd have been transferred to a orivste hospital under the care of her qualified psychiatrist.

Instead CRAPS were involved. When I asked the sister to get a wriggle on four hours after arriving and finding out the level of incompetence I was screamed at that I was obstructing my dd's care and she'd call the police if we left. We left 30 mins later after two actual doctors made the decision.

Meanwhile dd was assessed by CAMHS as needing therapy and the NURSE promised it quickly over the summer hols. As a result we declined the private offer to sort it out. However the psych the day after that promise was given by camhs confirmed adhd. Root csuse of depression and anxiety. GP advised to tell camhs. Guess what? "Well now mum, I think she's a bit old to be being diagnosed with that at 17 - ha ha". Oh and then the therapy didn't materialise for 3 months but I had misunderstood that commitment. Because I persisted in requesting to speak with a qualified dr, the camhs nurses decided to offer me a carers assessment. There were no resources to provide dd with what was promised but there was money for that and for three assessments to civer theur arses for doing diddly squat.

DD recovered and is now at Cambridge. Not due to the nhs but due to her parents having £6k to spend on clinical care the nhs was incapable of mobilising to provide whilst having thousands to botty cover.

I trust the op will forgive me for asking who exactly in the marvellous nhs she actually thinks the piss taker is. I can assure her it isn't me although I trst she would call me Mrs Roses and not "mum".

Well done @epsom camhs and @epsom and sthelier hospital. I fund the disgrace you both are. Shocking. Beyond shocking

I waited 3 weeks for an urgent GP appointment for a condition that was affecting my whole life and I’d been refused a repeat prescription for because a “review” needed to be done. Prescriptions can only be ordered a couple of days before they’re due to run out but appointments are like hens teeth.

On the day of the appointment I got a call from school to collect asd son urgently because he was in crisis. Of course I diverted to school and it took half an hour or more to calm son down enough to get him into the car. I tried ringing the surgery but the lines were engaged.

I was 10 mins late for appointment and the next patient was already in. According to the receptionist she simply took my time slot. But apparently that didn’t compute with the GP who refused to see me because I was late. I am a registered carer of two children with complex needs, yet that’s not a good enough reason to be late.

My condition deteriorated and cost the NHS more in the long run.

I know there are time wasters who need to be dealt with severely but I am a struggling parent who adopted two beautiful but complicated children and willingly gave up a lucrative career to do so.

I didn’t stroll in late assuming I would still be seen. I was obviously stressed and broke down in tears whilst trying to deal with a child who needed my attention.

I resent being added to the statistics but I resent also that I ended up costing the already stretched NHS more money because a stubborn GP couldn’t simply swap two patient times.

@ontheroses, sorry to hear about your experience. The example I gave though was someone definitely taking the piss. She knew when and where the appts were but apart from the first made no attempt to cancel just didn’t turn up, then lied to the GP to say she wasn’t informed. She was, I told her, and said no further letters were going out. AND she had text messages. Which I know was the right number as I’d spoken to her on the same number.

I am a regular patient and hospital appointments always run late, always, and gp appointments 50/50. I don't particularly mind, I've caused clinics to run late when I've needed emergency steroids etc and seen my consultant on an emergency basis, so I expect some other poor sod is in that situation or similar when my hospital appts are running late, so it's give and take.

Clinic appts however make it sound as if it's more likely to be more routine things, and not setting alarms etc is an abuse of the system. I am guessing that if they were told their appt time had gone, but they were welcome to wait until you had a free appt, then proceeded to wait a good few hours then the likelihood of them forgetting the next time will be largely reduced.

Dentists do it all the time. Appt gone, but sit and wait for a cancellation or an fta and patients are grateful to be seen.

It's a culture shift that needs to happen. People see the nhs as free as we don't okay at the point of service. People are like spoilt children, not taking care of things because they know they'll be replaced. It doesn't cost so it doesn't matter. As an aside, I think that it should be a wake up call if prescriptions had the price of medication on them, and invoices with the cost of appts etc but £0 payable on them (or similar) so people know it's not free.

Yes there are times when not attending a hospital appointment cannot be helped, in August my Consultant wanted me to have a barium meal x ray, in September I had a follow up appointment but had not had an appointment for the x ray so he reordered it, last week I was at a conference for 3 days returning on Friday night to a letter posted on Tuesday giving me an appointment for the x ray for the Friday, obviously I missed the appointment and obviously I couldn't let them know because I didn't see the letter until after the event, that wasn't my fault was it? so why should I be labelled a timewaster or refused another appointment, I DID ring them on Monday to explain but by the attitude of the person on the other end of the phone it was very clear that I was in the wrong

Actually have remembered a few months ago I had a missed call, Then they called back a few hours later. To say that the clinic I was supposed to be attending that morning was cancelled due to staff shortages. Luckily I hadn't received any letter telling me I was due to attend so was at work.
The second letter about a new date did arrive (and think they confirmed by phone a day before). Wonder how many people just get no notice of these appointments.

OhTheRoses

What do you mean by this?

by an hca in a uniform

I do think systems need to be improved in the NHS - I was supposed to attend a hospital appointment on Thursday that I had been waiting for for 6 weeks. The appointment was at 2.30pm so I arranged to swap shifts with a colleague as I normally work 1pm-8pm and she works 7am-2pm. At 10am I received a text from the hospital but as I was at work I couldn't read it but assumed it was just a reminder. As I walked out I opened the message to find it said words to the effect of "Reminder, you have an appointment on " so I rang the clinic to query it and the receptionist just breezily replied " Oh yes, the clinician running the clinic is sick so we have rearranged the appointments."

If I hadn't called to check the text (which said nothing about a cancellation/rearrangement) then I would have turned up to that appointment and wasted my time. It was bad enough that I had rearranged my day for it, at least I didn't waste a trip to the actual hospital.

Oh the roses - agree with some of what you are saying. As a clinic sister my shift started at 9am, but patients where booked in at 8.30am. So I used to come in at 8.15am to set the clinic up.

Management told me I had a time management problem. No, I had a didn’t want patients waiting for ages problem.

But I could do this because I am older and didn’t have childcare/caring issues. Some of my younger colleagues couldn’t.

I left the nhs 2 years ago.

The thing is, however, MrsCasares if any oc the following happened in the real/commercial world people would actually, really and truly, lose their jobs:

Inviting external stakeholders in for 8.30 meetings but substantive staff unavailable to meet with/look after them.

Shouting at external stakeholders and accusing them of them of being late when they were not.

Providin incorrect meeting information on a regular basis and messing key stake holders about.

Telling key stakeholders they had to call head honcho Dr or Mr but referring to key stakeholders by first name or "love", "darlin", sweetheart. And eyerolling if stakeholder has the audacity to ask for name to be used.

Shouting at key stake-holder that they are late for a meeting when they are 20 minutes early

Failing to communicate accurately and apologise for mucking key stake-holders about and have empathy theor time is important too.

And so it goes on.

Can someone in the nhs please explain why it is acceptable to behave like this to the scummy old patient? And why hcps especially nursea get so arsy when they are called out for what would be totally unacceptable in any other sector or life path.

Telling key stakeholders they had to call head honcho Dr or Mr but referring to key stakeholders by first name or "love", "darlin", sweetheart. And eyerolling if stakeholder has the audacity to ask for name to be used.

This is your hobby horse and, frankly, the vast majority of us don’t give a stuff what we’re called if we get treated.

It’s pointless comparing an understaffed, underfunded, stretched beyond capacity organisation to a commercial one.

And you think commercial organisations aren't stretched to the limit AlsoHuman. You know what happens when we are? We're in at 8 and leave at 7. No overtime. No whining allowed. And if we are rude to customers or clients or stakeholders and treat them like subordinates and keep them waiting due to inefficiency we get sacked.

It's not a hobby horse love, it's called equality and I expect to be treated as an equal. Clearly you don't but perhaps you regard yourself as sub human rather than also human.

I regard myself as a patient, love. I expect the NHS to treat me if I’m ill and do its best to make me better. The way I’m addressed has zero effect on my clinical treatment or my chances of recovery so no, I don’t care. If I’m ill enough for hospital treatment, I’m too ill to even notice, let alone be bothered what they call me.

Well I'm frightfully sorry but I think the care and excellence would be far better if every patient were afforded the same level of respect as all other stakeholders. If they aren't they become the scummy old public.

If my consultant requires me to call him Mr, I require him and his staff to call me Mrs. That's basic equality. I am no less significant as a human than anybody else and I do not believe a patriarchal organisation can be fully trusted.

I sincerely believe that if the inequality and patriarchy ended it would have a benefical impact on patient care which is too often sub-optimal but we are all supposed to be grateful.

Most routine treatments or monitoring of chronic illnesses do not render one incapable of knowing what is going on. That is reserved for things like itu.

Most routine treatments or monitoring of chronic illnesses do not render one incapable of knowing what is going on

I said I wouldn’t notice or care what I was called, not be incapable of knowing what’s happening. It’s nothing to do with patriarchy, men are called by the terms you object to - usually by nurses, most of whom are women. Find something that matters to complain about.

Absolutely AlsoHuman men are called by the terms I object to, usually by nurses. Well those nurses can speak to me as though I am equal to those men. And those men should address those nurses as their equals or the nurses shoukd use their first names.

What is it you don't get? If a nurse calls a dr Mr or Dr then that nurse can call me Mrs Roses. The nurse may believe he or she is subordinate to the dr, but I "lovey, or sweetheart" am not.

I didn’t say I didn’t get it. I said I don’t care. Why does it matter to you that I’m happy to be called by those terms that upset you so much? I wonder which of us HCPs are likely to go the extra mile for?

I work in clinic too, if a patient is 2 mins late I will block the ability to self check in and they have to go to reception to book in. We get strict timings for appointments like 5 mins for a blood test. Why should my other patients have to wait due to one person not being on time? We often run late with patients booking an appointment for one thing and then asking us to treat a number of issues.
We try our hardest to help with everything, but it's getting to a point where we miss our lunch break or end up finishing late, costing us more in childcare.
Then there are times when a patient will need extra time as they are upset, very poorly or the odd fall outside the surgery. I am always willing to spend my time with these patients.

But if people could attend the appointments on time it would help a very stressful job become a little easier.

More empathy is needed on both sides. Yes, if one is late it should be common courtesy to apologise and give an explanation... However, people need to understand that there are many valid reasons that someone might be late - some of which a person may be uncomfortable discussing: (depression, anxiety, memory problems, issues with a child/loved one/pet), finances (not being able to afford gas, bus fare etc). I absolutely cannot go to these appointments alone, nor am I able to phone and cancel (and people don't always check emails) so I'm also relying on whoever has planned to come with me to be on time, remember the appointment, not have anything else come up etc.

Just because YOU don't think something is a valid enough excuse, that doesn't mean you know the whole situation. This comment regarding alarms not going off for a midday or afternoon appointment? Maybe that person has depression and struggles to get out of bed. Maybe that person works nights. Maybe that person is forgetful and needs those alarms to remind them. Maybe they overslept for whatever reason. Remember, these people are unwell in some way (for the most part, otherwise they wouldn't be in a medical center).

Also, I've had some really disheartening experiences both at A&E and with my GP.

*My chronic pain, exhaustion and general malaise has been constant for over ten years and I am yet to get a diagnosis or someone to take me seriously. I've just been offered co-codamol for the short term despite telling my GP that paracetamol products make me nauseous. My fatigue is dismissed.

• Showing up at A&E suicidal or after self harming, waiting for hours to be seen only to be told to go home once my injuries have been dealt with. "Oh, we'll have the home treatment team go round tomorrow", they say. Never hear from them again. That's if I even get to see the mental health team, which has only happened twice. *Being threatened with sedation while having a panic attack.
• The "shouldn't you have grown out of this by now?" in response to my self harm. The disbelieving looks when the nurse taking my blood hears that I don't like the feeling of needles, sees my scars. *Begging for a smear test because I've had frequent bouts of UTI's, cystitis pain and vaginal pain for years but being turned away because you're not 25. Okay, I'll wait five years and hope that whatever the problem is can be figured out by then. Hint: it wasn't. *The MRI I had and had to chase for months before being told it was normal. The multiple blood tests that I still don't know the results of because I never heard back. The physiotherapy that never went ahead because I never got the letter. The fact that I am literally unable to get therapy at all because I need to get an appointment and self refer, which I can't do... because of my mental illnesses... which I need therapy for.

When you're begging for help, to be taken seriously, only to be dismissed... yeah, sorry if I'm not eager to see you.

When still teaching we had an appointment system which worked well until the local football team had an important match on tv. All the 8pm parents expected to be seen at 630pm, I took great delight in keeping to the running order, if a mere football match was more important that's their problem. The arrogance of the public can never be overestimated.