To think this finger gap is clearly infected?

[goneaway2]

Surely this is infected? Been told by drs receptionist to take him to a pharmacy then come back if infected rather than them actually showing the photo to a dr.

It's very hard to tell from a badly lit photo, but it's a tiny wound and it doesn't look particularly infected to me, just weeping a bit. If it is infected, it's very minor and probably something a pharmacy could easily deal with, so yes, I think you've been given the right advice.

I don’t much like the look of the red rings, so you could be right.

We’re going to break community pharmacy if they have to act as GP triage for free, but you’ll have to do what you have to do to get treated.

Redness and weeping both indicate infection, which is clear I believe in this instance. Without meaning to sound dramatic, people really do underestimate how quickly a minor injury can develop into a major infection if left untreated. I would contact your doctors again and push to be seen.

It didn't haveany red around it all yesterday. Was quite shocked when my son showed me it this morning. Managed to get an appointment after phoning them, thankfully but all it really needed was a dr looking at the photo to make a quick decision first. Normally they do that.
I have had a bad experience recently of being told to go to a chemist for an ear infection that was very painful rather than being able to get an appointment via the gp alliance by 111. I ended up in tears in the pharamcy after they told me they didn't have the training to help and I was in immense pain by that point, eventually the pharmacist had to phone 111 for me to be given an emergency dr appointment at the hospital after 30 minutes of embarrassment in a busy supermarket pharamcy.

It is a hard one to answer because a lot depends on your pharamacy.

Our local pharmacy has a prescribing pharmacist, so they are allowed to prescribe antibiotics for small things.

So in this case, going to the phamacist, he would say yes/no to being infected and then prescribe antibiotics if needed.
It saves lots of doctors appointments for straight forward things.

I have done it several times with kids and different things, a couple of times he listened to their chest and said - no chest infection, and a couple of times he has prescribed stuff.

But that is not true of every pharmacy. And it may be the case that he can do it partly because the pharmacy is attached to the GPs and we are registered at that GP. He is also these days very booked up and it is hard to do a walk in.

Yes if it’s getting worse not better and the red is growing you should get it seen.

I'd stick a bit of sudocreme on that and wait another 24 hours.