GP Surgeries are NEGLIGENT if they're not doing face to face appointments

[AmIEmptyOrNumB]

My GP surgery never stopped. They just triaged so 90% by phone and those essential face to face appointments carried on but with masks etc. Why is the government not doing more about this? These Surgeries denying all face to face appointments are failing the hippocratic oath.

I am so fucking fed up of this never ending stream of utter shit against GPs. The vast majority are on their fucking knees they are so overloaded, but because you can’t “see” it it isn’t happening

The number of GPs in the town where I live is the same as it was when I moved here in 1991. The population of the town has grown by around 25% in that time. In addition, the surgeries serve a number of rural parishes, all of which have had significant population growth because of all the extra housing that has been built.

It's no bloody wonder the GPs are stretched, they've got loads more people to look after, even disregarding the impact of Covid and the demands of an aging population.

I think it’s possible to have the utmost respect for GPs as individuals and to recognise the current system fails them as well as us.

My gp has refused to see anyone since this began.

I had a c section that got infected they refused to see me and said as I work in a medical field I know the signs of sepsis do take myself to hospital it I become unwell.

Refused to see my poorly newborn and said go to a&e who were pissed off that the GP refused to see us.

Over 6 months later and I still haven't see. Signed off post Natalie because my GP won't see anyone

I had a missed call from my GPs surgery, on ringing them back, I had to listen to a recording asking to more or less be patient, don't abuse staff as they are all trying their best in these "difficult times".

Almost everyone I've spoken to has had difficulty accessing their GP whichever surgery they are registered at.

Most people have been jabbed, doctors and staff have been doubled jabbed. People are frustrated especially as dentist round here have been opened for routine visits for at least six months. The really are up close and personal with clients.

Financial resources for the NHS have plummeted and been used for vanity projects. How much did those ridiculous Nightingales cost? How much was diverted to friends of cabinet ministers through dodgy contracts? ...

And that's exactly why the cries about "funding" aren't the answer, or at least not all of it. We could give every penny the UK has to the NHS and what's to say it would make the least difference without thorough reform?

@Congressdingo

then we'll have to pay £99 to speak to a GP. Then people will use the NHS more appropriately or the poor will become more ill. This makes me desperately sad

Last time I read about charges for appts a fiver was mooted. I know it's a few years ago but bloody hell from five quid to £99 is a leap.

I'm totally against charging anyway for many reasons but I'm not particularly poor and I'd have a hard time finding this much on a regularish basis.
If I look back at the last month if this was in place I would need to find 3 fees for me, 2 fees for DP and 1 or 2 for a child. So 6/700 pounds in a month. Add on prescription fees and I'd be broke.

To see a GP privately in UK now is £99 - go online and check it out. I understand that in Ireland over 18s pay 50-70 Euros already as they have no NHS. Even a £5 is too much if you are in poverty and unwell IMHO.

Government needs to invest in training GPs.

I'm not a GP but given the choice of 12hrs of verbal abuse versus a hospital consultant position with 20 min appointments and fixed breaks you can see which is more attractive to a trainee doctor (exc ED as this is also hard)

When I asked the receptionist for an approximate time for a telephone consultation, I was told they could not provide that and it would be sometime that day. I queried this as I had to work and was told my problem couldn’t be that bad if I still went to work and couldn’t sit and wait (all day) for the call.

Made me feel like I was inconveniencing them so much. I never got called.

I'm not a GP but given the choice of 12hrs of verbal abuse versus a hospital consultant position with 20 min appointments and fixed breaks you can see which is more attractive to a trainee doctor exc ED as this is also hard

Exactly. In fact, I'm an ED (A&E) doctor as well as a GP, and being a GP is considerably harder. A&E is intense, but there is a camaraderie and you have way more support than a GP because you're in a hospital, with access to imaging, pathology, colleagues for advice etc. As a GP, it's you, by yourself, in a room 12 hours a day, being shouted at by patients,, with fuck-all support and no resource.

I have been with my GP surgery for since 1970! It has changed from seeing the same GP each time to not being able to get an appointment or phone consultation, even before COVID, apparently we now have one part time GP surgery owner and one locum. Our town has experienced massive house building and all these people need a GP.
I came out of hospital after having a radical hysterectomy plus, and despite informing that I lived alone with no support, received no back up or any contact with my GP. I am desperate to change surgeries but most of them in our town are the same. I expect if I went private I would see the doctor fairly quickly.

I agree.
My husband required a Dr's appt.
When he got a telephone appointment he was told he was absolutely fine.
His right arm was 2.5 inches bigger than his left, it was red, painful and hot to the touch. He almost begged for a face to face appointment.

No, no, Mr sunshine alligator, it doesn't sound infected at all. You don't NEED to be seen in person.

2 days later he was in hospital with a severe case of cellulitis, he stayed for 5 days whilst they tried to get the infection under control, re-opened his arm, had to remove some of the infection.

He has had cellulitis 3 times since then, and they have refused to see him face to face at every request. He has started to just bother 111 and they get him OOH appts because our GP are negligent.

If you are calling and told to call at 8am it is likely any advance appointments have already been taken
There isn’t an infinite number of them
Most GP’s work a 4 hour session with either 10 or 7 minute consultation per session so could see 24 people in the AM or PM. If you have 5 GP’s working all day that’s still only 240 appointments. And some have to be double appointments because they are more complex. Out of that 240 some of them will already have been filled with reviews (mental health and medication for instance).
If they have 10,000 patients that is only 2.4% of their list of people a day

@thereisonlyoneofme

I have been with my GP surgery for since 1970! It has changed from seeing the same GP each time to not being able to get an appointment or phone consultation, even before COVID, apparently we now have one part time GP surgery owner and one locum. Our town has experienced massive house building and all these people need a GP. I came out of hospital after having a radical hysterectomy plus, and despite informing that I lived alone with no support, received no back up or any contact with my GP. I am desperate to change surgeries but most of them in our town are the same. I expect if I went private I would see the doctor fairly quickly.

I also had a hysterectomy recently what is it that you were expecting from your GP can I ask?

Its so stressful. Firstly the battle to get through at 8.30am. Redial after redial until you finally get through to the telephone queue.. Then having to explain it all to the receptionist. Then the wait for the phone call which can be absolutely any time. They don't give a shiny shit about our work or other commitments. You answer it or you miss it and if you ring back because you've missed it, it's tough shit, 'they're too busy, try ringing back tomorrow'. If you do get the call you just have to answer it wherever you are and explain your bowel issues or whatever in front of whatever audience..I hate it. I don't ring unless I absolutely have to. I can feel my blood pressure rising, like boiling, at just the thought of the music on their phone. There's no wonder things are getting missed, it's too hard to get seen. And I don't blame it on the receptionists at all. I feel really sorry for them. That's one job I could never do. The system is broken.

All I have is hugs for you as it is indeed a shitshow for those who are actually living it @MissLucyEyelesbarrow - I'm a PM and 99% of pts are fab but that 1% who are not are particularly vile and present daily to GPs, reception/admin and nurses. Your team, although smaller is with you!

It's not just GPs actually. I have a private dentist and they still haven't opened their doors to people walking in from outside (it is in the town centre so I used to pop in to make appointments), and you can't make an online appointment either.

I assume you have to phone up and beg to see someone.

My doctors surgery are still only doing telephone appointments although they are now doing smears, vaccinations etc with the nurse to be honest I think my particular surgery have taken it as an excuse to do as little as possible, getting an appointment was always an ordeal before covid so i think they are secretly delighted with the new system.

@igelkott2021

It's not just GPs actually. I have a private dentist and they still haven't opened their doors to people walking in from outside (it is in the town centre so I used to pop in to make appointments), and you can't make an online appointment either.

I assume you have to phone up and beg to see someone.

Dental practices have been open since June last year but you can't just pop in like before as there is a locked door policy. You should be able to get an appointment though especially if you are private.

Dental practices have been open since June last year but you can't just pop in like before as there is a locked door policy. You should be able to get an appointment though especially if you are private

Inconsistency with dentists, too.
Mine and my childrens' appointments cancelled, rebooked and then cancelled again as they are not seeing routine due to Covid.

I only managed to get an appointment when I had a ginormous wisdom tooth abscess and tooth had to come out. No further routine appointment allowed.

[quote TheReluctantPhoenix]@LemonRoses,

I don’t care whether it is ‘free at the point of access’.

We need some kind of system which works, regardless of whether copayments are required.

Everyone looks at the U.S as an unfair system but we are pretty much there here, just conning the average person that they have a marvellous ‘free at the point of access’ service. We don’t.

Want to see a GP, next appointment a month away. If I pay £75 (and an annual membership fee), I see a GP same day, pretty much at the time of my choosing. In pain and need a hip replacement, waiting list now 2 years (?). If I have insurance or have 10-20k, I can go in in a couple of weeks and have state-of-the-art surgery.

The NHS might have had its moment in the sun but, especially post COVID, and with a few exceptional pockets of excellence, it is a second class service.

Why do we keep kidding ourselves it is somehow wonderful?[/quote]
You might not care but the people who cannot afford to pay probably do. The people with serious long term conditions whose insurance stops paying care.
Pretty selfish not to look at bigger picture.

If we funded it properly, if we treated staff better, if we took it out of political control, it would definitely be better. As is, it’s anything but second class - overwhelming majority of people report receiving very good care and treatment.

How did you get time for doctors appointments before covid? This sounds like your employer's issue tbh. Also, mostly when I've spoken to teachers they've asked for calls after 4pm and usually it's not an issue to accommodate that.

@sheepisheep - before Covid I could make an actual appointment either for outside of my working hours or for specific time so that cover could be arranged. I asked for a call back outside of my working hours (and as I only work part time this should be easy BUT the response was that this would not be possible. Every call back that was attempted was while I was at work and after two calls that I could not answer I was treated as a DNA.

@Tistheseason17

Dental practices have been open since June last year but you can't just pop in like before as there is a locked door policy. You should be able to get an appointment though especially if you are private

Inconsistency with dentists, too.
Mine and my childrens' appointments cancelled, rebooked and then cancelled again as they are not seeing routine due to Covid.

I only managed to get an appointment when I had a ginormous wisdom tooth abscess and tooth had to come out. No further routine appointment allowed.

I'm guessing you're NHS patients. NHS dentistry is on it's knees through lack of government funding.

Our dentist is NHS and we have had routine check ups and I had a filling in June.

My mother used to attend a patients committee at the local gp. They asked her to attend.

She quit after a year- as did three other patient reps

The three main complaints all had the same solution suggested by the non nhs people and every time they were shot down. End result - they quit because what’s the point of having patient reps if nothing changes

Complaint 1 - missed appointments

Solution - either charge for missed appointments or three strikes and your out. Numerous reasons that could
Not be done. End result was nothing changed

Complaint 2 - time wasters and hypochondriacs

Solution as above / agains knocked back

Can’t remember the third but that also fell on deaf eats

[quote BungleandGeorge]@CurlyhairedAssassin have you seen the antibiotic resistance levels in some European countries? Everyone wants a magic pill but actually half the time what people should do is go to bed and rest (I’m not referring to UTI in particular). If you think covid is bad wait until we have no effective antibiotics in a few years time. Sending samples off for everyone is not best practice, nor is ‘dipping’ urine in the GP practice. A lot can change in a few years of course people need to be reassessed and treatment would generally be given according to symptoms. It’s not unreasonable to expect someone so acutely unwell they need antibiotics to be off work. It’s a different story for routine appointments and I would agree there needs to be some ability to schedule around work
If you’re not happy with your GP complain and let someone who is medically trained judge whether the treatment is appropriate or not. People don’t spend years training for nothing.[/quote]
It's not that I need antibiotics because I'm acutely unwell, it's because I'm neutropenic and likely to get neutropenic sepsis. So they hammer me with antibiotics for any UTI, mild chest infection etc etc because I can't fight off bacterial infections

To add it's not just about UTIs. Let's say I have tonsillitis and need antibiotics. Before anyone says it, I've never had viral tonsillitis and I get it fairly regularly. I ring up and can't get through or I get through and there's no appointments. Repeat for X number of days
Is it really safe to leave someone neutropenic with a raging infection for that long?
In that situation I would be off work but that doesn't help getting through (the phone cuts you off if more than 20 people queuing)

Last time in desperation I rang my consultant who prescribed antibiotics and had them couriered over (my consultant isn't at my local hospital) so I'm going to ask him about rescue medication