To think this is what happens when receptionists are the ones who decide whether or not you actually *see* a GP? (Ear infection)

[lCantHearYou]

Wednesday last week- woke up with an intense pain in my left ear, and assume I’ve just jammed my ear plug in a bit too far, but over an hour later the pain is still there and I can’t hear out of that ear, so I ring the GP surgery.

The receptionist, based on no medical expertise whatsoever, asks what the problem is and unilaterally decides that all I need is a telephone appointment. The GP she’s scheduled the call with is well known in our community for not doing face to face appointments if she can help it and generally having the attitude of just wanting to get you off the phone as quickly as possible.

Later that morning, GP call. I explain that I’ve been having this very intense pain for several hours now that paracetamol isn’t really touching, my ear is ringing very loudly and all external sound is very muffled and barely audible.

She decides over the course of the 3 minute call that since I’m recovering from a cold I’m probably just a bit congested, tells me to take some Sudafed/other decongestant and paracetamol and it should right itself in a few days.

I start alternating pseudoephedrine, paracetamol and ibuprofen, but the pain wakes me in the night every night.

Thursday evening DH, the DC and I travel up to PILs house.

Friday morning, DH and I leave for a long weekend abroad (on the Eurostar, thank god we didn’t fly or I’d probably have at least one ruptured ear drum).

By Friday evening the pain and hearing loss has now spread into the right ear as well. Spend the whole weekend in pain and practically deaf, which kind of spoils things somewhat.

Monday evening, we all get home. 3:00 am I wake up in so much pain I can’t keep still, DH wakes to the sight of me sitting upright, rocking back and forth with my hands clamped over the back of my head. He calls 111 who schedule a phonecall with a Dr… who rings back 3 and a half hours later and says, sounds like an infection, I can prescribe antibiotics or you can just wait and see your own GP. I opt to see my own GP, so 111 Dr puts in notes that I need a face to face appointment.

So we’re back on the phone to the surgery, to the receptionist who’s halfway through saying “I can schedule a phonecall…” when I tell her about 111 Dr’s advice to seek a face to face appointment. Then she relents and schedules one with a different GP to the one I spoke to the week before. At the actual appointment, this GP barely needs to glance in my ears before saying it’s a severe infection, inner ears are very sore and red, lots of pus and gunk and, in her words, “looks incredibly painful”.

I’ve now been on amoxicillin and cocodamol (which I’m alternating with ibuprofen) for 5 days now. I can still barely hear a thing beyond the very loud ringing and the sound of my own pulse throbbing in my ears. All external sound is very muffled and distorted. If I wait too long between taking pain meds I fucking know about it… I’ve taken to sleeping with the cocodamol under my pillow so that when (not if) the pain wakes me in the night I don’t have to grope around on my bedside table to find them. Part of my job involves being on the phone, sometimes for hours at a time, so I have to jam my earphones right into my ears and turn the volume up full, and by the end of my shift (I work very late at night) I’m doubly exhausted from the effort of straining to hear anything.

AIBU to think that if, on that first day, the receptionist or indeed the GP had paused for a moment and thought “hmmm, intense inner ear pain, badly affected hearing, maybe get her in so we can see if there’s an infection”, then I could have started on antibiotics that day and at the very least the infection would likely have been contained to one ear and might even be starting to get better? As it is the receptionist didn’t bother, the GP didn’t bother, and instead of getting better it got considerably worse, the antibiotics are making fuck all difference and I’ve now had almost two weeks of intense pain and hearing loss for no good reason? And AIBU to be pretty pissed off about it?

Sorry for the twilight rant… I’ve just woken up feeling like the back of my skull is being squeezed. Again.

I'm convinced that there are some fire-breathing dragons out there who never made it through an interview for a GP receptionist because thy were considered too soft.

I didn't read it as the OP blaming the receptionist- but that the system at her GP surgery isn't the best. The way the surgery is run needs changing.

I'd raise the issue with the practice manager.

She thinks receptionists are deciding who sees the GP on a whim, and not following a strict protocol given to them by their practice, and for some bizarre reason also thinks the GP not wanting to see her even after speaking directly to her is because of the receptionist. Why otherwise make that patently clear in the thread title and for the first half of the rant, and in the last paragraph of the rant? So, she may have been wrong in blaming the receptionist, but she bloody well did blame the receptionist more than she blamed the GP.

No not that I’m aware of.

My Mum probably said words along the lines of ‘ooh it’s not a problem’ and minimised her symptoms, but I’m so angry that they didn’t want to see it. So grateful for private care in this instance!

words along the lines of ‘ooh it’s not a problem’ and minimised her symptoms

You're taking agency away from your mum, Kiki, saying that she can't know her own body, can't stand up for herself & otherwise a "Doctor knows Best" & "More Investigations are always better than fewer" policy should apply instead.

YOU ARE NOT BEING UNREASONABLE. I’ve been left with permanent damage in one ear (now needing a hearing aid) due to the doctors not taking me seriously. I can’t blame the receptionists for that as they’ve always been great, but in general ear issues aren’t treated as urgently as they should be.

Um no I’m not. I know my Mum, I am the same. I know she will have minimised symptoms I’ve done and do the same from a lifetime of being told I’m exaggerating etc.

I wanted to make the point before others did that the issue here is that she should’ve had a face to face and it’s not on her to articulate her issue to a GP verbally.

It makes sense in my brain anyway.

I don’t understand peoples insistence that receptionists decide on appointments all by themselves!! They are instructed by the GP. The practice tells their receptionists what they want them to do and look for. Yep there are some crappy receptionists who I don’t doubt enjoy the ‘power’, but they are following instructions.

Would it make you feel any better if I told you about the time I woke up, as a teenager, with weird discharge coming from one ear, went to A&E (times were simpler then), and was seen by an absolute fucking idiot of a registrar who, instead of prescribing 'watch and wait'-style treatment, proceeded to flush it so aggressively that the infection was driven into my inner ear and has permanently damaged my hearing, 20 years on?

It was because the infection had spread to his brain, which I’ve heard of as a rare, but obviously very dangerous complication.

Same.

Also there are Out of Hours GP and A&E services for exactly these situations. You can be proactive and seek treatment that's not direct from your GP

If you request a face to face appointment, you should get one, end of. The only reason to deny, that I find acceptable, could be a severe cough. It's should be no ones decision to say what appointment you have. Next time say you have anxiety being on the phones, even now calling you're having a hard time, so you need to be in person for the actual appointment.

GPs aren’t the NHS, they are private contractors who provide community services. And they do it very badly and continuously complain giving the real NHS a bad name.

So sad for you OP. And painful. And totally not surprising since UK medical treatment depends on a nihilist approach to practice. I’ve lived here 30 years and after a disaster when three different GPs misdiagnosed cholocystitis (gall stones), having done ZERO investigation, I finally was properly diagnosed abroad where I had to have surgery. Very embarrassing for the GPs since it is a basic and simple diagnostic condition. Since then,
the only way I get proper treatment is by being VERY proactive and pushy and not caring what receptionists think. On occasion I’ve had to exaggerate symptoms to get proper treatment. From a health economic standpoint, it makes perfect sense to tell the patient to go home and come back in a month if the problem is still there. However from a personal health point of view, it can be disastrous as we have seen in the case is mentioned in other posts.

Oh- and had the tories not been systematically destroying the NHS BY CHRONIC underfunding and needless reorganisations the situation would not be so dire. No other advanced industrial nation spends so mlittle per capita on health as the UK.
The other critical component is that not enough British GPs are being educated and trained. There is a ridiculously small quota in the UK medical schools. That’s why so many foreign doctors come here to practice. That itself is immoral and unethical, since it is in effect development aid from the poor countries to the UK, since we refuse to train enough doctors ourselves

For those blaming the NHS most GPS are private contractors and a lot of them sold out and are now owned by American healthcare providers. It’s in their interest to pad as many numbers to claim for funding from the NHS but do as little work as possible and staff as minimum as possible.

however the narrative of blame gets shoved into the NHS and ‘private could do it better’ well when it comes to GPs private have always been doing it and now it’s gone to the Americans we are seeing the impact.

Our receptionist lies, a

Same, I make myself a nuisance, I make sure I've done my research and I say what I want.
I hate it, I'm not naturally assertive, but I've been fobbed off enough times that I've decided I need to be a squeaky wheel.
My beloved partner was killed by being fobbed off so I don't give a shit who I offend in my pursuit of the service I deserve. (EVERYONE deserves)

Wow this sounds agony. Keep up with the pain relief Op, if it worsens go straight to A&E. I had an abscess in my ear 7 years ago and the pain was unreal. Ended up with emergency surgery and the pain was like nothing I’ve ever felt in my life, including childbirth.

Sadly, we have a similar experience. DC age 3, seriously ill, really bad cough, raging temp, negative for covid. Gp receptionist insisted it was a cold and refused an appointment. 3 days later, I fight for an urgent appointment. Got it via telephone. Thankfully gp was good, asked me to bring him in. 5 minutes into the appointment there was 2 GP’s in the room giving him emergency steroids and further pain relief. Whilst the receptionist who initially refused an appointment for 3 days, phoned for emergency services. DC had pneumonia and was blue lighted to hospital, they wouldn’t let me drive him there. It was actually the GP we had seen who phoned me back a week later extremely apologetic and advised seeking a conversation with the practice manager. We had to make a formal complaint about the receptionist.

I understand the NHS is on its knees but it is unbelievable. Receptionists are not medically trained to determine if an appointment should be granted or not. I really hope your ok Op, rest up as much as possible and take it slowly.

I sympathise. The most pain I've ever experienced in my life was a double ear infection. I got similarly fobbed off by GP, and after 5 days of no sleep I walked to the GP surgery and sat in hysterical tears in the waiting room, never felt pain like it.

When I actually got to see the GP she immediately prescribed antibiotics and codeine, and said one was dangerously severe.

I'm not a wimp, I have my full back tattooed, and a tattoo over the ribs and spine is nothing compared to the paid of a bad ear infection.

Our GP does phone appointments as standard for everything BUT they call you back relatively quickly and if there's anything suspect they have 2 doctors literally waiting to see you f2f.

I think our practice has an excellent system. It means they can sort through what's what but if there's anything that rings an alarm bell, they will say - how fast can you get down.

In one instance it was so obvious what was wrong the GP said - I've sent antibiotics prescription straight to the pharmacist you can pick them up in 10 mins.

One key difference the reception staff are great.

If they aren't, then they get slandered on our local fb site. One receptionist got fired because one person wrote a post and honestly about 50 other people wrote their example and the practice manager was reading it! It was in this instance easy to know who said receptionist was because she had a distinct accent from another part of the UK.

The following week Practice Manager wrote an update - we understand that there has been complaints about how reception staff handle calls. We want to let you know that the issue has been addressed we are currently recruiting a new receptionist. Please bare with us while the other 2 receptionist have to deal with larger volumes. We will get to you.
Resulting in about 200 likes!

When you see a practice that has a large catchment area dealing with people efficiently - you know it can be done.

This hasn't been my experience before I moved here though, so I do empathise.

I'm a GP receptionist we were asked if we wanted training to triage phone calls we all said no, we didn't want that level of responsibility. If we have appointment available anyone who calls gets one and they have been face to face for months ( during covid all were initially phone calls and if GP thought it necessary a face to face the next day.)

I feel so sorry for you. I am extremely upset that you have been through all this. You should have been treated straight away. I've had ruptured eardrums. I was almost screaming with pain, it was unbearable. Of course, I had been told that I couldn't have antibiotics because "we must not over-use them". I now have intractable and loud tinnitus.
I think perhaps we all need to become more assertive about seeing our Doctor when we need to. After all, the Receptionist is not trained, is there to do a job, which is to listen to us and meet our need. If they gave that kind of service as a worker in Tesco, they would be in trouble. I do hope you are feeling much better. I have to say though in my experience this might mean you are susceptible to further ear problems so please, if you need help in future, do not let anyone fob you off and demand to be seen straight away. Good luck, and I hope you keep well.

As a PP has said, if it’s not improved in 5 days of antibiotics and you have severe pain you might want to get seen again.

I nearly lost my son because of the stupid receptionist refusing us a face to face appointment.
son started complaining of very lose stools and stomach ache. Left it a few days then he added it was still there with blood. Phoned the docs - call back advised watch diet and send in a sample - few days later then had blood in pee - phoned docs again this time oh it’s a bladder / water infection have some antibiotics ( still not been physically seen) clears up but starts to lose weight rapidly. 6 weeks later the blood is back - back to the docs - more antibiotics ( demanded he got seen but still no) 3 month later after 4 lots of antibiotics and still no face to face appointment. I called out of hours got seen - he was admitted straight to hospital 10 days later he came home. When we got to the hospital once they did his bloods his levels were that low if he had been left much longer he would have been dead. Turned out that at 21 he has crohns and colitis with kidney stones.