Waited in hospital since 10pm to see out of hours gp. It's now 2am. Do I give up and go home?

[GrrrlPwr]

There's 5 people ahead of me in the queue. Receptionist has no idea how long they will all take.

Do I go home and plead my GP for an appointment tomorrow?

Feel so stupid to have waited so long and to go home. But I ache so much. I need to go to bed

I work in a GP surgery & every morning we get a list of our patients who contacted 111 and still need a call back. Usually they weren't aware they were waiting for us to open!

The lack of access to GPs is causing huge strain on A&E. DH waited 7 hours recently at A&E and started chatting to other waiting who seemed to be there for things that would normally be dealt with by a GP. The doctor who treated DH confirmed the same, majority of people they see were there because they can't get a GP appointment or because of delayed treatment something that could have been sorted sooner had become more serious.

I was taken by ambulance to A&E as I was struggling to breath, arrived at 8pm they put me on a chair and wheeled me to A&E reception, they checked my oxygen levels twice when I was feeling worse but I ended booking a taxi home 8 hours later as I was feeling very weak and didn’t want to lie down on the floor.

In all those 8 hours there were only 3 patients in front of me and none of them, not one, was seen.

If you can afford it, use a virtual GP service like babylon. Costs about £50 per appointment or an annual charge but they will write you a prescription and even email it to a pharmacy for you. Appointments all night. This shouldn’t be necessary but you can thank the Tory voters

If you need anything like this, book an appointment with 111. They will often just organize a ringback and then a prescription that you can just collect. If you do need to be seen, you'll rarely be kept waiting far beyond your booked time as they do the triage over the phone.

Our A+E waiting times are 5 - 6 hours today. Relieved to have just made it out in 4 hours with DD who has chest pain. Paeds wasn't any quicker on Monday evening, 4 ½ hours and no actual diagnosis or treatment.

Trouble is more and more people are needing to use a&e as can’t get to see a gp.
Our surgery is now run by an American company and they are not regulated like before so there is no limit to the number of patients per doctor which means they can keep a much larger patient list. Which in turn means there are now too many people wanting to be seen and not enough hours in the day to fit them all in….

@Mandyjack

I'm sure you can now get antibiotics in a chemist, try and get some Tyrozets too

They don't do tyrozets anymore sadly

@ThePoisonousMushroom

but then I walked around on a broken ankle for a week and spend 3days with a splinter in my eyeball beforw getting them looked at

You’re saying that although it’s a badge of honour, but actually it’s really very foolish. You could have lost your sight.

Yeah, absolutely ridiculous

@Malibuismysecrethome

How are surgeries seeing more patients and appointments when no one can get an appointment. Frankly I don’t need to be told to sign up if I could do better, I think the defensiveness is part of the problem. Maybe the staff could do a better job.

Maybe the staff could do a better job?? ODFOD

At our surgery we have GPs, nurse practitioners and pharmacists dealing with more patients, both on the phone and F2F than ever before, while getting constant complaints and being told we should "do better". It's no wonder general practice staff are leaving in droves and people like you will end up with the service you deserve

gunnersgold

At the weekend i called 111 several times, staying on the line for 45 mins each time. I never ever even got through. It was a bit scary tbh.

@SilverGlitterBaubles

The lack of access to GPs is causing huge strain on A&E. DH waited 7 hours recently at A&E and started chatting to other waiting who seemed to be there for things that would normally be dealt with by a GP. The doctor who treated DH confirmed the same, majority of people they see were there because they can't get a GP appointment or because of delayed treatment something that could have been sorted sooner had become more serious.

Conversely in General Practice there is much more workload which would normally be done at the hospital as many of their consultant clinics are still running by phone then sending all the blood tests, investigations and medication requests to the GPs, patients awaiting operations are sent to the GPs for pre-op tests and bloods and those whose hospital care has been delayed are needing more attention and medication changes

@Sillyname63

This is not something you should go to A&E with it is not an accident or an emergency, please use this as a wake up call keep a supply of medication at home for use till you can see either your doctor or a pharmacist, an antibacterial throat spray, dissolving paracetamol & codeine to gargle and swallow then some honey & lemon in hot water, it is people with minor complaints ( I appreciate you felt like shit) but a very sore throat is NOT something you should go to A&E with, you could have gone to a 24 hour pharmacy and been home with a hot water bottle in bed a lot earlier.

Tonsillitis complications are life threatening so please do not provide comments that are simply dangerous, @Sillyname63

How are you doing @GrrrlPwr? Did you manage to get some antibiotics?

Hope you're feeling better OP, tonsillitis is awful

I hope you have seen someone now and have meds.
Tonsillitis is awful

Where I live we have had 3 new housing developments and around 20 new blocks of flats in a radius of about 5 miles. No new GP services at all. There are 2 new primary schools and 2 new academies, not to mention another international school and a couple of private prep schools. The GP services are so stretched I don't know how they cope. My surgery is really good, to be fair, but they are doing mainly e consults and telephone appointments. There just aren't enough doctors. We had a really good urgent care centre in a local day hospital, but it has closed.

I feel your pain... husband actually had an abcess, was in a lot of pain. Ended up needing surgery. After 12 hours on a chair he got a bed in a corner of A&E (still no bed on a ward) then surgery the next day... it's truly shit.

@CuteAndFluff

So glad I live in a different place to the UK. System is fucked. Where I live you can go online and choose an appointment to see any available gp as far as you choose to travel, usually that day, often zero cost. We have out of hours gp service that will come to you so you wait at home. Again usually no cost.

UK system is screwed

They come to you at no cost? Where snouts do you live?

Has OP replied yet? Maybe she is recovering in bed

The system is broken.

All these Babylon GPs etc are presumably ex-NHS staff who have left for a more pleasant life? We're literally driving away the staff we desperately need (don't even get me started on Brexit). Underpayment and understaffing is the crux of the systems problems at all levels. Understaffed mental health / social care leads to more pressures on primary care. Understaffed primary care means people can't see a GP so go to A&E etc. Its a negative cycle.
The whole thing needs turning on its head into a nationwide, connected, simplified system.

Antibiotic resistance is a massive threat to us all. Tonsillitis rarely needs antibiotics. It is hideous though.

How many commenting here about lack of NHS cover voted Conservative in the last election.

YOU ARE WELCOME

My niece used to get very bad tonsillitis to the point she almost died twice due to her throat closing and blocking her airway. Cant remember what it's called but it does happen. She eventually had to have them removed.

I get so frustrated on these threads of posters piping up with “just fill in the e-consult” without considering not all GP’s offer that service. Ditto online appointment booking (the only thing you can do online at my practice is request a repeat prescription). Even for a telephone consultation you have to join the scrum calling at 8am. No call queue - hang up and try again. 100+ calls to be told try again tomorrow. You could do that for a week! Which is how people end up at out of hours with tonsillitis. (Not saying that’s you OP, just that I can see how it happens.)