annoyed at doctors surgery for not letting me know result

[JosieMay1970]

I had routine blood tests one month ago and I never heard anything, it’s been over a month, today I received a letter telling me I’m prediabetic. Why didn’t my doctors phone me straight away to tell me this? Why have I only found out over a month later, would they have let me known sooner if it was a more serious result?

it makes me worry they aren’t telling me other things that could be wrong, or would they usually phone earlier if they found anything worse?

am I being unreasonable in being annoyed by this?

Did they not tell you to phone for the results after? My doctors surgery is unbelievably busy and they always tell you the time frame to phone. They specifically say they don’t have time to call us.

Why didn’t you call them for results?

Yes you are being unreasonable. Its not a huge issue. They are probably busy telling people about serious things.

Most GP surgeries now have an online service for checking results, ordering prescriptions etc. I know that isn't the point but maybe worth looking into. I used to always ring for any results as I suffer badly with anxiety if I don't know and the online service has been great for me.

Honestly they don’t have time to phone everyone! A month won’t have made a difference to your care and the fact that it’s been that long shows how busy they are. So I think yabu.

They didn't phone you as it's not a high clinical priority.

The onus is on you to phone for routine blood results.

Agree it is not urgent, more for information and advice. Prediabetes can often be reversed by diet and lifestyle changes. What did the letter advise? You could probably see more detail via nhs app

It can't be news to you that GP services are extremely stretched?

There’s something called “personal responsibility” which is evidently lacking here.

In future every time you have a test for anything, make it your personal responsibility to get in touch about the result.

Surgeries are busy, staff get distracted. Outbound calls are time consuming and take up valuable resource time.

Each time I call my surgery I’m 15th in the queue or something equally mad. So does this not explain how busy they are? I have always been told to call for my results which i do.

YABU.

Why didn’t you phone or pop in for your results? The onus is on you to find them out. It’s your health, after all.

I work in primary care, we average 200-250 results a day. We only call the ones who need urgent attention, and annotate the others to indicate what needs to happen eg normal no action, make GP or nurse appointment. We don’t have the time or capacity to call them all. You have more access then ever now to manage your own health, via the NHS app or online surgery accounts.

This is part of the reason primary care is drowning as so many patients want spoon feeding.

I always call my gp a week after a blood test to check the results. The only time I have been contacted is during pregnancy when they discovered I had a random blood disorder which turned my nice easy 2nd pregnancy in to a high risk, weekly screening nightmare (all was fine in the end though)

Yes I'd echo the above getting back to you about something like this in a month is fine. A very significant proportion of over 40s whom are overweight if tested would be either pre-diabetic or diabetic if tested, it's just not something that's often tested for unless you come in with specific concerns. It's not routinely tested for as the advice for pre-diabetic is the same advice for everyone - eat a varied balanced diet low in fat/processed foods/sugars and likely eat more fruit/veg with smaller portions of other foods with a good amount of exercise to maintain you weight within the healthy bmi range.

They are not your secretary you phone them

Why have I only found out over a month later,

Because you didn't ask?

When I had a blood test recently, I was told when the results would be available and that I should phone for them and/or look at the NHS app. Do you have the app, OP?

Our practice ask us to phone for results.
A couple of times I've forgotten and received a letter about them. If it's really serious the gp will call.

My GP always says results are usually back in a week. If you don’t hear from us then all is fine. If anything shows up we’ll call. They get arsey if you ring and ask them (even though like OP they haven’t rang previously with information that I should have been given!)

hi everyone! Thanks for all the replies, I feel a little calmer now although still a bit annoyed as the nurse who took the bloods said if anything abnormal comes back I’ll receive a call within 1-2 weeks. That’s why I figured they would have rang by now. Although you’re all correct, I should probably have rang but was under the impression there was no need to.

I don’t have an app or online results

I reversed my pre diabetes pretty quickly with a better diet and exercise. It’s not massively serious if you make changes to your lifestyle

They are not keeping other health issues from you, and they have informed you of the issue. I’m not sure what your complaint is.

The patient has always had to ring the surgery for blood test results unless there's something urgent showing up.
If you are signed up to the NHS app now you can access your results online and save yourself the hassle of trying to get through by phone.
My GP surgery cancelled my appointment by text at short notice the other day and told ME to contact THEM to arrange a new appointment. 1/2 hr after I got that text they put a post on Facebook saying they were experiencing a high volume of calls!

They do so many blood tests, they can't contact everyone, and would usually suggest that you contact them for results. They will only call you with results if a GP has reviewed anomalies and thinks there is something fairly urgent that requires immediate attention or referral. I've got pre-diabetes as well, and you're okay. It is something that can be managed over a long period by lifestyle changes, but not any medication or anything like that.

If you had been over the pre-diabetes category and into T2 diabetes proper, it is likely they would have called you with the results.

My GP will always ask that I phone for results from blood work. They are simply too busy to get back to everyone!

You’ll get more information from the prediabetes forum on https://www.diabetes.co.uk/ than you will from your GP. You have to join to access the forums, but they are brilliant.

A GP may see 30+ mildly abnormal test results in a day. If they phoned everyone they wouldn’t have time to see the patients who had appointments booked that day.

Test results take about 7-10 days to come back. The doctor may take 1-2 days to see them. A mildly abnormal result will result in a task to admin, asking them to invite the patient for an appointment. The task to admin may take 1-2 weeks to be actioned, depending on how busy admin are, staff shortages etc. Then if it’s a letter it may take a few more days to arrive.