How important do you think it is to be on time for a GP appt

[Ireolu]

Just that really.

Do you think it is important to turn up on time or early for a GP appt? Do you think you shd still be seen when you are 10 mins or more late for a 10 minute appt.

This is just for adults over 18 not for children. TIA for thoughts.

i think most skilled professonals have less problems around a surgery running over than someone on NMW or a zero hours contract who lose a lot (proportionally) of their money when they have to hang around for ever because of who knows what reason.

I understand that surgeries sometimes have delays for good valid reasons (including "GP slept in") but i want them to be upfront about it and tell me "oh, Bref, sorry, we're running 30 minutes late today". At least then i can go out and grab a coffee or something, or go back to my car and make a work call

I was more than 10 min late taking my dad to a gp apt several years ago. He was very unwell and in the space of a week, lost the ability to speak, write, and his mobility was very limited. It all happened extremely quickly and he was unable to get out of the car. (It was basically like he didn't know how to) When we arrived the receptionist said we'd missed the apt but his gp was brilliant and fitted us in and gave us the (bad) results of an mri scan and started the wheels turning for palliative care.
Of course in "normal" circumstances I wouldn't be late

I do this and dh who is shit at timekeeping always looks at me like I have ten heads, to be fair he is getting a bit better now. To him if it takes 7mins to drive to the surgery he leaves with 7mins to go. He doesn't factor in getting stuck at the lights or behind one of the many learner drivers doing lessons here, doesn't factor in parking even though the car park is nearly always busy these days. I swear it's a factor in why he is almost always stressed out and I'm not.

GP appts are a scarce resource and not showing up wastes money, denies others the appointment and causes disruption to their schedule.

We always get there early, partly because two missed appointments without calling, gets you de-listed as a patient. I don't blame them. They're doing their best and no-one likes time wasters.

Always arrive early. Things running late is annoying but understandable and isn’t an excuse to be late yourself.

You should aim to be on time. I always aim to arrive 10 or 15 minutes early so that I can get parked and walk to the front door.

I aim to be sitting in the reception between 5-10 mins before my scheduled appt time.

Obviously, things happen and sometimes you get held up. If that’s the case, I would try and ring as far in advance as possible and give them notice - they may be able to accommodate you at a later time.

I would avoid just turning up late without informing them as they may not take you depending on how late you are.

I was late for a nurse appointment once. There was a crash on the motorway and what is usually a 20 minute drive took me 50.

I tried to call but the phone line was closed
I arrived in reception 10 min late.

The receptionist said its ok, the nurse is running 20 mins late so there are 10 min still to wait.

I sat down and almost immediately got called back over.

The nursery had sent a message to reception refusing to see me because I was late.

I was so cross, if I had been on time I would have just been sitting in the waiting room.

It's as if the nurse believes her time is more important than mine. She was just using my lateness as a way to catch up because she was already late.

I had to rebook for 2 weeks time, leading to be being rather unwell.

I don't make a habit of being late, infact, never been late for the nurse or dr before. This was an incident out of my control , but I got punished for it to help the nurse put her lateness right

I work in a GP surgery & there are always exceptions. Patients arriving more than 10 mins late for their appointment will not be seen in general but if you have, for example, a disabled person who's taxi turned up late or somebody with a learning disability then we would always do our best to get them seen.

Somebody turning up late because the Dr "kept me waiting" last time would most definitely not be an exception. They aren't sitting their drinking coffee & twiddling their thumbs while you're waiting.

My kids had regular orthodontic appointments. Parking was a nightmare, I'd have to plan to be there at least 30 mins early and even then sometimes I'd have to drop them at the door so they could go in on time while I drove onto local estate, parked and walked back.

I live in South Devon and there wasn't a bus route I could reasonably use, I'd have to get a bus to a nearby town and then wait for bus to hospital so instead of kids being out of school for just over an hour they miss more than half a day.

It isn't always easy.

I give people ten minutes and if they go past those ten minutes, they won’t be seen. One woman threw a full-on tantrum in the waiting room because she was 15 minutes late for a 30-minute appointment and I declined to see her as I wouldn’t have had enough time to provide quality care, so rebooked her for the next day.

She still wasn’t happy with that because it ‘wasn’t her fault that she didn’t know where the clinic was’ (I later checked the message history and she had been sent the full address as well as the date and time of her appointment) but I just reiterated that her poor planning was not a reason to make me late for the other patients on my list. The next patient was already there, 15 minutes early, so I saw her instead.

Tardiness is not good. If you make an appointment for anywhere have the decency and respect to be there on time.

I think it is very important, even though there may be a delay in being seen if previous appointments have overrun etc.

I like to arrive between 5 and 10 minutes early to give myself enough time to check in without getting into a rush. I don't mind sitting in the waiting room with my phone, kindle or a book.

I think it’s important to be on time or a little early for anything.

I do think it’s nice if it’s possible to squeeze you in though still.

I was late to a dentist appointment.
This was my first dentist appointment in 5 years as it’s just not possible to get one and I left extra early to make sure I was there on time.

It was just Sod’s Law that there was an accident on the road and I got to the appointment about 15mins late.
They had let the person who had got there early take my appointment and then they kindly allowed me to take his, as it didn’t affect the rest of the appointments.

The GP always came to us & my mother gave him tea & her best ginger cake.

He’d take notes on welfare of whole family before seeing whichever child/adult ill. He was unhurried, relaxed. I sound Edwardian!

"On time" is one delay away from "late". Turning up early means having "insurance time" to cope with a delay.

On time, maybe 1-2 minutes early.

Appointments always, without exception past 10am, run 15-30 minutes late though. Really, really irritating when you're on time, and really hard with small DC in tow (Not blaming anyone other than targets from on high).

And does your professional job make you just as likely to keep people waiting because you had a life threatening emergency earlier in your shift?

In my experience, the main reason a GP runs more than a few minutes late is when they have to admit a patient to hospital or handover a patient to paramedics.

@Iwasafool yeah but the difference there is you planned and dropped the kids off etc. most of our patients would come in 20/30 mins late with their coffee and shopping. It was just the entitlement of well I'm here now so you're going to see me that frustrated me

Someone in our local fb group had an appointment at Broomfield Hospital. Got a cab rather than rely on unreliable buses. He was on time. Was just pulling up at the hospital when they phoned to cancel So back home again £38 each way.

I feel a bit guilty now. I had a home delivery for one of my babies, my doctor was dying to be there for the birth. The surgery was at the end of my road and he kept sneaking out the back door of the surgery to come and see how I was getting on. He missed the birth, arrived seconds too late.

I dread to think how late his appointments were running that day.

You should be on time. I wouldn’t expect to be seen if I was late. I always turn up early to be on the safe side.

Obviously everyone should plan their trip to the GP carefully and have in place contingencies such as planning to arrive early incase they miss the bus, or can't get a parking space.

But, if the GP is already running behind and they were wouldn't have been seen yet any way turning them away would be petty. If they couldn't make it in time due to their condition - for example they have a stoma and it leaked just as they were leaving the house, or they felt very ill and struggled more on the journey than they expected the rottweilers on reception should be held back and able to show some discretion or compassion.

Not sure how you differentiate between genuine unavoidable lateness and someone taking the piss.

I think the system is so strained and overbooked, when a GP is running late with appointments, it is a positive for the system and those who made it in on time that someone can be sent away for breaking the rules and pleasure is taken in blaming patients by having the missed appointments up in big lights! I always think when I see those numbers thank fuck some got turned away or we would all be waiting until 9pm!

Why would anyone think that is weird.

It's how all my family - mine and IL do it - work out travel time and buffer time and then work out time to leave by. Then time to leave by work out what needs doing to meet that time - so then think though tasks. IL and DH are possibly more rough and ready but DMum, me and kids do tend to look up distances and times.

Only met on guy who never built any buffer time in and assume everything would go to his plan - never learnt either - everyone dreaded him organising anything as always went wrong.

Even with buffer times thing can go wrong - one time factored in 5 minute school faff and 10 minutes walk time to have school take entire fucking time and then some - did ring dentist to explain on the way but delayed.

Then spent next 2 years being really early for orthodontist as factoring excessive school faff as possibility and possible taxi delays to have none of that happen - and DD1 get increasingly annoyed we were so early.

Be there early so you can be seen on time. You have to plan ahead for parking issues etc

Why should everyone else’s day run late afterwards because you couldn’t be organised?