To think NHS GPS will never go back to "normal"

[CakeIsNotALuxury]

This morning I rang my doctors to make an appointment. I told them I was having chest pains and pain in my right arm like squeezing pains. I've also been very faint and dizzy. The pain is bloody horrific. I have never felt as unwell as this.
I have suspected heart problems but waiting on a referral. I was told they'd ring me.

It's now 3pm and no phone call. AIBU to be pissed off? I rang and spoke to the receptionist who said the GP isnt ringing in order of appointments and is doing it randomly. My chest feels even worse than this morning and i have bad breathlessness and feel very tired.

I understand they are over worked, but surely it shouldn't be this hard to talk to a GP?

@BattenbergdowntheHatches

Reading comprehension not a strong point then *@Jannt86*?

Primary care is already broken. What makes “literally no sense” is having a gatekeeper system that the public cannot access, meaning that basic healthcare is denied or delayed (unless you can pay privately). The whole of medical practice is becoming protocolised for consistency (as they should) so the gatekeeper role can easily be done by AI - that would also stop the have-a-go heroes who treat my husband’s patients (oncology) for piles for a year before referring them to someone with a functioning fucking brain cell who has to tell them their cancer is now terminal.

And GP’s are not specialists in anything - the clue is in the name. Some of them are quite clued up on pension tax avoidance ime, for obvious reasons. It takes years and another few sets of exams to become even a specialist registrar. The incompetence (with a few exceptions) coupled with the absolute arrogance and lack of insight into how the “service” is viewed by the public is Orwellian.

I already go private fir GP services, as does everyone I know with the tiniest idea of what quality healthcare looks like. NHS GP days are numbered - they are making themselves irrelevant and despised.

Secondary care is also broken. Dying people waiting hours for ambulances, people waiting hours in EDs which are more like a war zone, people waiting years for specialist appointments. If you remove primary care then how long do you think the rest is actually going to survive for when apparently all GPs do is stop patients accessing these services? It really hacks me off when people are so clueless about how precious our health service is and they'd rather be brainwashed by a government who is shamelessly corrupted into just accepting the collapse of a once near perfect and fair service and blaming the people who prop it up. GPs work tirelessly to keep the system afloat. They work in unsafe conditions and take on way more work than is safe or considered acceptable in pretty much every other developed country and they do it with fools like you literally laughing in their faces. There will never be an NHS without primary care. GPs days aren't numbered. In fact they'll probably do quite nicely doing less work for a cushy paycheque from 'virgin health' or going abroad where they're actually appreciated. It's the general public I worry about who have no clue what it feels like to actually not be able to afford healthcare. What is so difficult to see about this?

@BattenbergdowntheHatches

I’m far from clueless *@Jannt86* - I can only infer that you have zero idea about how healthcare is delivered outside of a communist system like the NHS. It’s exponentially better, in almost every way.

We have - with the best intentions - created the worst 2 tier system outside the USA. Those with the means - including me fwiw, no skin in this game - pay to avoid the NHS while those without means languish on waiting lists for third world care, the quality of which is only going to deteriorate. Meanwhile we have the highest paid GP’s in the world with what appears to be massive patient dissatisfaction. No GP I’ve ever met has sufficient insight to see this incongruity.

You could piss money at the NHS and it would still be shit by international standards, albeit perhaps marginally less so. So I’ll be delighted for GP’s to collect fat pay packets from Virgin health, but they might be unpleasantly surprised to find that they can’t work 3 mornings a week for 100k at times of their choosing and retire at 55. And those like the OP’s GP - who are demonstrably useless - might (and should) find it more difficult to retain gainful employment. There is a hell of a lot of GP “work” that does not require a medical degree, what it requires is speedy access to specialists and prompt referral in accordance with guidelines. Not some halfwit with a 30 year old medical degree pissing about with ointments and duff advice. The people doing this do not need or deserve six-figure salaries.

And yes, your “near perfect” system brought us Bristol, Alder Hey, Stafford, Shrewsbury, Ockendwn and probably many others I’ve forgotten. Clap, clap, heroes!

You are vile. I won't engage with you any more. Think what you like

Do you think a thread where the OP discovered she might have heart failure is the right place for this argument?

Cake how are you?

Hope op is OK?

My 76 year old mum spent 15 hours in a&e last weekend.
Sepsis.
6 days in hospital, 72 hours before she got a bed on a ward.
She still needs outpatient tests - god knows when they will happen. I'm encouraging her to explore private options.
This is my local hospital: