Utterly frustrated at not being able to see a GP?

[ismiseeire]

My health is detiorating! Sorry, in pain, so not a long explanatory post.

@ismiseeire

Acorn, I have repeatedly had to wait until I'm unwell enough to require actual admissision to hospital to get any help. It's absolutely awful.

So you've been admitted overnight and they still won't run the tests you need? It sounds like the hospital might be at fault as well as the GP.

I wish I could help.

Hospital have done several tests and then referred me back to GP to be referred onwards. That of course doesn't happen unless you can get an appointment with GP to ask them to read the letters. I think I've had about 5 admissions in the past year and several other useless trips to A&E where my bloods were normal so they tell you to see your GP! If only! I think the A&E doctors think that I go in there for entertainment at this stage.

My GP surgery has taken to playing a recorded message saying they’re busy, please call back. Not even giving you the option of waiting in a queue! Never mind getting an appointment...

I'm glad, not in a sinister way, that I'm not the only one and that people believe me.

I've only been able to successfully see a private gp over last year. Its quite crazy how basically every private practice is fully open to f2f appointments with no pre screening video call but for some reason the thought is that if a nhs practice does it all the doctors will contract covid and die.

I don't really get why paying privately somehow makes the doctors immune.

Really hope you get this sorted quickly OP. Have you searched online for an email address for the practice? Could you try knocking on the window at reception and staying there until they email the GP directly for you?

@ChronicallyCurious

I even developed an awful rash which I was told to send in a photo of when they clearly could have just seen me!

they don’t need to see you with a rash though, you sent a photo...

DS needs a 24h blood pressure recording doing before he can start his (forces) basic training. He's missed 2 start dates now. The GP is not doing it. Because of covid.
FGS, they can wipe the equipment and wear a mask, as can he. And they will all have had the chance to be vaccinated.
I work in ED, we still have to see patients!
Very frustrating for us hospital workers, it feels like there is a lot of fear out there, and it's all in GP surgeries. Why are we more 'expendable' than them?

Bloody ridiculous and frankly inexplicable - yes they have to take more precautions and fine that they only see people who really need to be seen after a triage process - but if you can’t even get through, or they refuse to see you when you explain the problem, it’s inexcusable. How can they all be working from home? There must be a significant proportion of issues that can only be assessed / diagnosed with a physical examination.

I’m very lucky that my GP surgery is pretty good - getting through is hit and miss but they tend to get a doctor or nurse to call you back promptly to see if you need to come in. One time a doctor I hadn’t seen before offered me a face to face appointment even though it wasn’t massively urgent because she could tell I was worried. Seems like a bit of a postcode lottery.

Is changing GP surgeries an option OP?

I feel for you op - some GPs are lazy and Covid has given them a great excuse (I used to be a Drs receptionist).

If I ran the NHS I would charge GPs every time one of their patients attended A&E for something that the GP could have sorted but they couldn't get an appt. that would focus the minds. Totally frustrating for hospital staff to not have GPs pulling their weight.

Not only does my GP surgery not do any face to face appointments for anyone for any reason, they have ceased offering blood tests, which are now 'centralised' (offered at five other surgeries in the borough )

I was referred for a panel of blood tests after a phone appointment. I called, was told I would receive a call back with an appointment for the blood tests within 24 hours. It was considered 'urgent' but not life threatening. This is how the GP explained it to me, not my interpretation.

Five days later, literally AS I was signing the consent forms, on the ward in hospital, for the emergency operation I needed (went through 111), the blood test people called me back. The registrar asked to speak to the guy and tore him a new one. FIVE DAYS for 'urgent blood tests'.

As soon as surgeries reopen I am moving practice.

Dh has been coughing for months and losing his voice. The gp over the phone ordered an x Ray and gave him a stronger inhaler and anti histamines. All without examination. He's an older male with a poor family history.

I've had multiple health issues and a cascade of problems that probably not have happened if my gp didn't try and do everything by bloody e consult.

You can't even ring our surgery at all. Ours was going down the shitter before covid, the phone calls were being answered by an external company and redirected. Now the phone line has been cut off and everything has to be done on line. So you have to very carefully fill out an e form for medical attention and lie if you are experiencing any pain or bleeding such as period flooding or nosebleeds as it will instantly cut you off and demand you go to and e. You can only fill the form in in office hours and then it takes 2 to 3 working days to receive a phone call from the nurses and even then thats hit and miss. Never the doctors. In fact the doctors don't seem to work there anymore, its very strange.
Oh and 111 is useless too, never ring back.

I just put up with it now, I've tried and tried to get my daughter seen due to her recurrant nosebleeds and severe headaches and u just can't get anywhere

Ah super, another GP bashing thread.

I'd better ask my other half where he's been for the last year, working 6 or 7 days per week for 14 hours per day.

Clearly not seeing the patients he's been claiming to, or running the huge vaccine process, or dealing with patients for whom the long wait to see (closed) secondary care specialists mean they are deteriorating rapidly, or catching Covid himself (at work!) and working until he was ill enough to be admitted to hospital.

Nope, just skiving. Cheers Mumsnet, it's been a real morale boost. If your GP surgery is being shocking, contact the practice manager. If no result, move surgeries.

Well unless your other half is sitting at home on a phone ignoring patients after they were in A&E numerous time, I don't think this thread is about him so there is no need to be shitty and gove us his working hours🤷🏻

I think there should be less postcode restrictions. That could relieve some gp surgeries and it could give patients more options if they want to move doctors. My previous GP is 15 min ride away from me. I had to leave it when I moved from 3 minute ride from them to the current place. Still sad. Loved him (as a doctor ha)

@Bluetrews25 tbh I don’t actually think that’s a good use of an appointment anyway. Why doesn’t he book privately as it’s simply to start training rather than for an actual health monitoring need?

Some of you have awful surgeries, our GPs are seeing patients F2F daily and even doing home visits. The only time GPs are working from home is when self isolating or their young children are. We are doing blood tests, smears, swabs, wound checks/dressings etc as usual.

@SchnitzelVonCrummsTum

Ah super, another GP bashing thread.

I'd better ask my other half where he's been for the last year, working 6 or 7 days per week for 14 hours per day.

Clearly not seeing the patients he's been claiming to, or running the huge vaccine process, or dealing with patients for whom the long wait to see (closed) secondary care specialists mean they are deteriorating rapidly, or catching Covid himself (at work!) and working until he was ill enough to be admitted to hospital.

Nope, just skiving. Cheers Mumsnet, it's been a real morale boost. If your GP surgery is being shocking, contact the practice manager. If no result, move surgeries.

Well if your other half actually is a GP you will know that you can't just switch GPs.

@SchnitzelVonCrummsTum

Ah super, another GP bashing thread.

I'd better ask my other half where he's been for the last year, working 6 or 7 days per week for 14 hours per day.

Clearly not seeing the patients he's been claiming to, or running the huge vaccine process, or dealing with patients for whom the long wait to see (closed) secondary care specialists mean they are deteriorating rapidly, or catching Covid himself (at work!) and working until he was ill enough to be admitted to hospital.

Nope, just skiving. Cheers Mumsnet, it's been a real morale boost. If your GP surgery is being shocking, contact the practice manager. If no result, move surgeries.

Clearly this thread wasn’t about your DP 🙄

even doing home visits

to do vaccinations? That doesn't count.

Otherwise you need a letter from the Queen for a home visit.

@amysteryforsaturday

Definitely ring 111 .

In same boat - six weeks of bleeding and no idea why - my therapist (employed by GP surgery) has said she’s ringing my GP to specifically ask them to see me, but goodness knows . GP surgery said the doctors only handle immediately serious emergencies now and don’t see or deal with any routine matters - said it’s for a nurse who just told me to crack on and stop complaining ...

That's awful.

I've had continuous and severe bleeding on and off since last June.

I've had a smear, 2 coils (first came out!), a blood test and an ultrasound. A diagnosis of endometriosis and possibly adenomyosis.

Admittedly some had been over the phone chats but i don't need to see the gp dealing with it all the time - but I've seen them and been treated when I've needed it.

That’s awful.

Even our surgery, which is awful (nowhere to move to or I would) has one GP a day in the surgery to see the people deemed as needing seen. The rest are working from home.

@amysteryforsaturday

Definitely ring 111 .

In same boat - six weeks of bleeding and no idea why - my therapist (employed by GP surgery) has said she’s ringing my GP to specifically ask them to see me, but goodness knows . GP surgery said the doctors only handle immediately serious emergencies now and don’t see or deal with any routine matters - said it’s for a nurse who just told me to crack on and stop complaining ...

@amysteryforsaturday Are you menopausal? Also quite a few ladies have had this after their jabs so it could just be a side effect that sorts itself out. It happened to a 70 year old lady after her jab, but is considered a normal occurrence. You could always fib and say as you've been bleeding for so long you keep getting light headed and dizzy. Maybe they will give you an appointment then.

@47SchnitzelVonCrummsTum do fuck off. Your dp might be super gp flying around and solving mysteries in his spare time. Lots of people are being left high and dry by the health service. Tbh I haven't even tried to get an appointment when I should have because even before covid, you had to ring at 8:30 on the dot and they had about 3 available appointments. The only competent doctor left, it's fucking ridiculous. I attended an appointment in the past about my depression and tbh was cross examined about my employment status like the worst kind of job centre advisor.

My whole surgery has closed because its some kind of covid centre. I have today completed an econsuøt thing, let's see how that pans out.

Some of these stories are horrendous.
We still have to run the 8am gauntlet to get through to the surgery on the phone, explain the issue and then go on a list to be phoned back by the nurse or Dr.
Every time we’ve done this we get offered an appt the same day. I guess we’re saying the right things to be taken seriously.
DS noticed some lumps in his neck a few weeks ago. He saw a GP on Friday, had blood tests the next Wednesday and a scan at our nearest children’s hospital the Thursday after that. All sorted within a fortnight.
We’re in Wales if that makes a difference