GP practice "not offering appointments"

[Darkestseasonofall]

This is a new low. Just called to make an appointment to be told they aren't doing any for the foreseeable future.
If it's an emergency you can call on the day and try to get a telephone consultation, but that's it.
I can see a huge rise in people attending ED in appropriately or just becoming very ill with avoidable things.
This isn't NHS bashing, I'm a nurse, but I can't understand how primary care can just opt out of 90% of their contract.
AIBU to think this is just silly?

Genuine question - how would patients like to book appointments? I understand it is so frustrating to wait for the phone to be answered

Online! It’s not just a case of frustrating! We have DD at home (long story why, but not our choice) she is normally in residential care) - she has the most severe epilepsy, complex learning disabilities and challenging behaviour). She has 1:1 care all her waking hours and 1:3 at night. There is a cleaner, so her 1:1 does just look after her all day.

I normally have to wait in a queue on the telephone between 35 and 55 minutes to get through to GP’s reception. Last week, I was 8th in the queue - when I got to 6th, the phone just went dead. I had to redial and was back to 8th - it took 35 minutes to get to speak to somebody.

During this time, I cannot have my full attention on DD as I am also listening to the phone. She might tell me she is going upstairs to change her incontinence pants and I haven’t noticed the subtle signs a seizure is coming. She has a seizure coming downstairs and falls down the stairs. She might land on her shoulder and be screaming her head off for an hour and a half. Cue trip to A & E for x ray.

I assume family carers to people with dementia or SAHPs for several young children have similar problems.

Yet I cannot book appointments online, nor go in person to arrange an appointment! The only way is the telephone. And no, I don’t care if it’s to keep us safe from the corona virus - I am more bothered about DD falling downstairs and breaking her neck!

(DH took her out for a walk in January; he didn’t think for 10 seconds and ended up with 2 fire engines, 2 ambulances, the regional support team and 2 police cars to help out. She had to have a head CT scan)

How many of the complainers on the thread would choose to work an additional two or three hours most days for none extra money?

Family carers get around £67 per week, often for working 24/7 - they would love to earn what GPs. Even in my own profession, working 80 hours a week for 35 hours pay is normal.

The “complainers on the thread” have every right to complain. It is outrageous that GP Practices are messing everyone about at a time like this. Some are clearly operating as they should so quite why others think they are exceptional is the question.

And yes, many people work hours every day for no pay. It’s quite the norm. Have a look outside your cocoons from time to time.

An elderly lady was run over directly outside my GP surgery. 80 years old, lying on the wet ground with two broken legs and crying with pain. If that’s not the definition of an emergency then I don’t know what is. The doctors refused to come out and assist her. A passer by phoned an ambulance which also refused to come because it wasn’t an emergency. In the end someone phoned her son at work, and he had to come and pick his mother up and drive her to A&E.

@WizWoz you just reminded me, my mum's husband had a suspected heart attack in the surgery car park and they refused any help at all. Absolutely disgusting.

And yes, many people work hours every day for no pay. It’s quite the norm. Have a look outside your cocoons from time to time.

This!!

Yes as above poster and previous posters, there is quite a lot of people who work extra hours to do their workload, and that tends to go with high wages jobs indeed. If we do need more GPs, which I am sure, then it should benefit practices to have this well known, they should be pushing for more themselves, and letting their patiences know too.
For me, I would love to be able to use an online system to complement the ever busy phones! At least you can log something online, and wait patiently for them to get back to you. And I really want to be treated with dignity, and like I am a human been indeed. No like I am a bother, for once a year I have an issue with my health.
And yes, we pay for health services, we do. And we have a voice that we have the right to use.

Some peoole are demanding face to face appointment when everything can be said in the phone and complaining.

Some people really need a face to face appointment and can't even get through reception.

I do fail to believe that an old lady with 2 broken legs would gave been turned down by an ambulance as deemed not an emergency and could have been transported with two broken legs by family.

Sadly, issues are also massively exaggerated.

Some peoole are demanding face to face appointment when everything can be said in the phone and complaining.

Last week, my wait of 35 minutes on the phone was because I had suffered for 2 weeks from

1. Hearing loss
2. Tinnitus
3. Pressure in my ear
4. When I put sodium bicarbonate drops in, as I thought it was excess wax - pain
5. Exhaustion after some sort of mild flu type virus a month ago (Couldn’t get a Covid test)
6. Sore throat on and off since February

The local audiology practice refused me micro suctioning, saying I could have a perforated ear drum and infection; I needed to see a GP.

Can anybody tell over the phone if it was just excess wax, otitis externa or a perforated ear drum and infection?

The answer is they cannot.

@WizWoz

An elderly lady was run over directly outside my GP surgery. 80 years old, lying on the wet ground with two broken legs and crying with pain. If that’s not the definition of an emergency then I don’t know what is. The doctors refused to come out and assist her. A passer by phoned an ambulance which also refused to come because it wasn’t an emergency. In the end someone phoned her son at work, and he had to come and pick his mother up and drive her to A&E.

Were you witness to this or did you read it on Facebook? I don't believe it for a minute.

I do fail to believe that an old lady with 2 broken legs would gave been turned down by an ambulance as deemed not an emergency
I was a bystander and it actually happened. I’ve given a witness statement to her solicitor.

@DarkMintChocolate, I didn't say everyone, I said some. My neighbour was complaining that his doctor had refused to see him after detecting what he thought was blood in her stool. She had a telephone consultation, was sent a sample in the nail to test for blood and was sent for blood test, told to call back in two weeks if no better and they would discuss referral for endoscopy.

The outcome would have been just the same if she'd met her face to face.

How many of the complainers on the thread would choose to work an additional two or three hours most days for none extra money?

Oh come on. You claim to be a highly paid professional married to another highly paid professional.

I don't know anyone in the higher salary brackets who doesn't work long hours for their fixed salary. Its part and parcel of higher salaried professional work.

I do fail to believe that an old lady with 2 broken legs would gave been turned down by an ambulance as deemed not an emergency

My 88 yr old relative lying outside on exposed ground in the November rain with a broken leg wasn't considered a priority/emergency by the ambulance service even when she was drifting in and out of consciousness. If bypassers hadn't stopped and called for local help to bring quilts, tarpaulin and umbrellas she would probably be dead.

We were told it was an "exceptional" day except we subsequently discovered pretty much every day is an "exceptional" day in the area.

At my surgery nurses are overwhelmed with face to face appointments, as are two practice nurse friends in two other surgeries. They tell me GPs have disappeared into their bunkers, other than to claim the QOF points payments from the Government for the work the nurses are doing.
The sooner GPs are salaried and accountable to the NHS instead of their current independent contractor status the better.

MrsDrudge that’s vile talk, either the nurses or you.

Jeremy Hunt hasn’t magicked the extra 5,000 GPs needed and a fair few have since retired.

www.rcgp.org.uk/about-us/news/2020/october/general-practice-is-open-and-has-been-throughout-the-pandemic.aspx I refer you back to this document so stop with the rubbish.

@LadyWithLapdog it may be vile, but true.

MrsDrudge It really isn’t the case. If you believe and can evidence it as such make a GMC referral.

www.rcgp.org.uk/about-us/news/2020/october/general-practice-is-open-and-has-been-throughout-the-pandemic.aspx

This article says that “most” of the 850 GPs the RCGPs spoke to felt that remote consultation was satisfactory. Even if all 850 agreed, it represents less than 3% of all GPs so is hardly representative or supportive of remote working.

They also state GPs have seen “ nearly a third of a million “ patients. This equates to around 12 appointments per GP. A time frame for this isn’t stated in the article - is it per day, per week, per month the GP sees these 12 patients each?

I realise the need for remote consulting, for infection control to protect everyone including HCPs. However, quoting this article is even more detrimental to the GPs justification of lack of appointments when the stats are interpreted in context. I can see why the Telegraph did not use it in their article because it is totally meaningless.

MrsDrudge - show your working for 12 patients per GP. What’s that about? How is the letter detrimental, for goodness sake? I don’t know what you get out of this, apart from scaremongering. GP surgeries are open. They have changed how they work and have had to adapt. End of.

Based on RCGP figure of 28000 GPs currently working in UK.

And for your information, Jeremy Hunt (of whom I am not an admirer) left Health Department in 2018.

@ladywithlapdog I am not scaremongering. I appreciate that HCPs have to adapt to provide a service to people, for which we pay.
However, if you quote articles at me to attempt support your argument I suggest you read and understand them before you post.