Doctor’s surgery is now using AI for appointments- not working

[Cnthnfne]

my GP surgery will now text a patient a form if they want an appoint. You need to fill in the form explaining why you need an appointment, it will be reviewed by a doctor and a receptionist will phone to arrange an appointment.
it is now not possible to book an appointment with a receptionist.
sent in a form early yesterday morning and I haven’t heard back. I will now need to phone them to chase up.
would take 3 mins under the old system. Plus, no allowances for people who don’t have mobile or don’t know how to use the internet: the elderly or the most vulnerable.

Our doctor does this too and it’s absolutely shit

I've heard nothing good about this system, unfortunately.

This is not AI?

There's no elements of AI in anything you have just described

This is not AI. It's an online form reviewed by a human.

We have had this system at our GP for many years and it works well for us. We receive a response on the same day and any red flags, the GP calls us in for a face to face.

We can also phone up but I often wonder if people without iT are at a disadvantage.

It drives me mad. You get asked about 100 irrelevant questions. God forbid you admit to having a headache, because it won’t let you proceed and tells you to call an ambulance! Then you have to go back and change your answers so it will allow you to complete the form. How do sick people in their 80s cope with this?

It really works well in my gp s surgery. But this is not AI.

I would like to see the equality impact assessment and risk assessment for that.

It won't just be those who can't access technology that suffer but also those with poor literacy.

Works amazingly at my GPs, I get a call or text with an appointment within about 15 mins.

Our GP surgery introduced an online triage form with a number of questions which you then submit. You rec

Sorry pressed too soon.
....You receive a response within 48 hours with either an appointment time via phone or in person. The recorded message on the phone line says that if you're elderly you phone and the receptionist will help you complete the form. It's not AI.

Our surgery doesn't do the form filling.
If you can get through the receptionist will either decide if you need to speak to a Dr that day or will give you a date, normally 2 weeks ahead, for a phone consultation. Then if you do need a face to face it's another two week wait.

I have no idea why it's still like this, it can't still be due to covid reasons surely.

Our GP has had similar for years. The form is actually on their website. You can add pictures for rashes etc. You can specify best time to call you back or have an appointment. It works really well. Those without the Internet can still phone.

I prefer the form to hanging on the phone for an hour at 8am. It’s only available for non urgent things at my practice, you have to ring for more urgent things. Our surgery says someone will review the form within 24 hours. Trouble is, half the time you log in and it says the form is currently unavailable so you end up having to ring after all.

It might work better than the current system ours has.

Yesterday I rang at 7.59am only to be given a message they were closed and would open at 8am. Called back dead on 8am to be told I was caller no.45.

An hour later I was still only caller number 23 so I gave up. Sometimes I’ve held on for an hour, got to caller no.1 and the bloody system then cuts me off!

Maybe a system like you are describing would be better? Although my elderly and poorly parents wouldn’t be able to work this which means extra stress on me on top of everything else I do for them but as I’m finding out, the NHS doesn’t give a shit about the elderly.

This is not a one off at our surgery, there are so many new builds on our area and zero extra doctors employed or new surgeries being built.

I don't understand either and I'm a retired GP. My own surgery where I worked went back to F2F appointments in November 2021! We have a spacious building so easy to space people and appointments out. We were getting stressed because 70% of phone appointments needed to be seen so it was taking up so much time. The surgery where I am a patient are still phone call first and no rough time given. It's an appalling service. Even in June 2020 we were giving a half hour window when we would phone.

Yes its a system made in heaven for the articulate sharp-elbowed who can game the answers for access.

Its hell for anyone with any kind of technical, cognitive or language difficulties or those with mental health issues which are difficult to articulate on a blunt form.

I would also very much like to see the actual research done on this with details of the test cohort and the equality impact/risk assessments.

As others have said this isn’t AI!

my practice does e consult and it’s great (apart form the fact you can only submit during opening hours). I filled it in around 8.30 yesterday morning and got a text just after 9 to say the duty doc would call between 9.30 and 1 and they did. They save same day appointments for people the duty doc decides need to be seen in person after the phone call (although this time as I had an ongoing issue / history and had been seeing a different gp they found a slot for me with them tomorrow instead)

honestly much better than anyone being able to take up appointments with colds etc or relying on reception to triage based on limited verbal information

you can still call up if you can’t manage the form etc but I imagine they take the same sort of info over the phone and feed it into the same system

Yep not AI and my surgery has been doing this for years. I love it for non urgent things especially eg my DS had very bad acne. I was able to fill in the form, upload a photo and they texted back to say they'd prescribed a cream and I could pick it up direct from chemist. No missing school for an appointment that takes 3 mins but you wait for ages. Just pop to chemist when convenient. Lovely.
I get that people say what about elderly but frankly my mum is just as tech savvy as most of my friends and perfectly capable of using a mobile phone app or laptop etc and AgeUK run tech courses and there's all sort of support to help people get online. Of course there's some vulnerable folks who can't but then hopefully the phone lines will be kept for them.

That's not AI.

Our surgery still has the option to phone, but points out that it's much quicker for them if you use the form.

My young adult children much prefer the form to having to talk to a person! I like it too - you can just write down every symptom you have, with time to think about it, and then when the doctor phones, they've got it all in front of them so no need to repeat.

They also direct you to the best place for help; my son filled out the form and got a response within a couple of hours directing him to a pharmacist (and also told him which was the nearest one that was open). It means you don't have to second-guess yourself and worry about wasting a doctor's time - you can fill the form in and let them decide.

Ours do this an I quite like it. No sitting on the phone hot ages to get no where.

However our surgery seems to be Run well and we always seem to get an appt.

We used to have a great online form system, very straightforward, available all day and you generally got a response within a couple of hours. We’ve recently moved onto the PATCHES system which is awful to use, if it actually lets you get far enough to complete the form. It’s an automated online form, not AI though.

My doctor now has a similar system and it’s great; every time I’ve used it I’ve had a response in hours and the issue resolved that day. Much easier than faffing around trying to call and waiting in a queue at 8am. That said, they do have provision for those who can’t get online (you can call or go in and someone basically fills the form in for you), it’s bad if your doctor genuinely doesn’t have anything in place for these people OP. However our local Facebook is full of people getting angry on behalf of the elderly who can’t access this service, despite regular posts pointing out that the surgery has put lots in place to help them and advertised it extensively.

our GP also claims there’s an element of AI in the process but I’m not sure what it is .

This is the system my GP uses. I think it’s triage rather than AI.

Ours generally works ok, and if you’re really ill you can usually speak to a GP the same day, or see them if it’s deemed severe enough.

Where it falls down and fails is when patients can be spectacularly mistreated because everything’s been done over the phone, they haven’t passed the magical threshold of being ill enough to see a dr and have been misdiagnosed for as long as it takes them to see a dr.

FIL has had a recurring problem for a few months, it followed a heart surgery so the GP, without seeing or examining him, referred him back to the cardiologist, which took months, the cardiologist also didn’t examine him, prescribed something that had horrific side effects which made FIL ill enough to see the GP, who examined him and diagnosed a hernia. Had FIL seen a GP months ago this would have been diagnosed straight away - instead he had a wasted appointment with cardiology - who still didn’t look at him, and months of unpleasant side effects from a drug he didn’t need!

I understand why these changes have been made, but in making them I think the problems within the NHS are far worse. Primary health care isn’t doing its job any more.

Sent in my econsultyestetdsy at 10.30. Responded within half hour, with a link to book a appointment. Non urgent, so fine. Also added some blood tests to one I was already booked in for this week, so saved an extra visit.

Other times have had same day call at a specific time, and medication same day. Works like a dream.

Just a note though. Different GP's use different systems, so you'll still see disparities even with e-consult, and of course they still have to have people behind the system to respond effectively.