To not understand how SystmConnect gives more GP appointments if they’re having to triage appointment requests on top of seeing patients

[C0lintgeCaterpillar]

Anything that makes things fairer is great but surely sifting through hoards of requests, checking up things on records to ensure they make the right appointments is going to suck up more of their time.

If there are no receptionists who is going to register new patients.
Send old records back, sort out insurance claims, prescription requests and a thousand other things.

If your issue requires seeing one then you’ll still be able to see one. But if you want to see one and your issue doesn’t actually require an appointment then you won’t. If there are access issues that mean a phone call / text message / email aren’t accessible to you and only face to face communication is accessible to you then you’ll be able to explain that and arrange some adjustments

Honestly it is such a faff that you just want to give up. You have to answer the questions in the (in)correct manner to even be with a chance of getting a f2f appointment.

I don't understand the love that anyone has for it.

It saves time because there are lots of things a GP can respond to in 2 mins rather than use a 10 min appointment time. My son had a few odd spots across his back, sent GP a pic and they diagnosed a very common viral infection that clears up on its own. I reckon it took them a couple of minutes at most. Before I would have taken a 10 min appointment and also had to take child out of school for it and I would miss work. I think this system is so much better. When it’s been something more serious, I’ve had a call to book a same day appointment

My dc have autism and sometimes I need to be at appointments with them. Phone calls can be a nightmare in these situations so I hope we will get F2F when needed .

On my doctors system, you can say how you'd prefer to be seen to (phone/ email/ in person) and there's space to explain

Ah ok

I've just done this for a potentially dodgy mole. I thought it was great! I asked Dr Google which features are diagnostic so I'd know the relevant info, provided that along with a photo, got a text back telling me no immediate concern but follow up if changes. Massive timesaver for both GP and me.

I think the system may be more effective but as someone who works in secondaryI have noticed decline in the quality of referrals and lack of continuity of care. A lot doctors have not seen the patient or had any meaningful or constructive contact before making the referrals.

But that's untrue. E Consult doesn't redirect you based on anything you've written - it just collects info for a human to read, assess and act on.

It's not 111 online, that's totally unrelated to your GP practice.

It works very well for us. The thing that I've noticed most is that the GPs are never running late these days, presumably because there is less need for F2F appointments and many things can be done via phone/messaging apps.

Ok, I concede I may have misunderstood the steps my husband went through, but the fact remains he had a real difficulty getting a f2f appointment.

I still think it is a dreadful system. Perhaps made more dreadful by my surgery.

Honestly I want all your GP surgeries, mine is totally shit.

This is the info from eConsult on my GP website. So it does say you might be redirected or it may send it to the surgery.

Like any system it depends on the surgery at the other end really. These can be really decent platforms that are head and shoulders above phoning at 8 hoping to get an appointment after waiting on hold for an hour and having to give an outline to the receptionist; but if the surgery at the other end has inadequate staffing to properly deal with the forms and/or offer decent level of appointments then yeah it sucks.

Yes, you get given options before you fill the form out.

The advice they give might well direct you to see a pharmacist or A&E or whatever, but only based on the information you submit on the form to be reviewed by a human who is giving you their clinical opinion.

My surgery has AskMyGp and I love it. No more struggles to get through on a line that's permanently engaged, I just type out what the issue is (you can add photos too) and they respond accordingly. As others have said you can request face to face or call back or whatever. We have never had a problem being seen when we need to be - although that's obviously just us being lucky there's a good surgery at the end of the process.

My surgery has AskmyGP

The system itself is fine, but for example up until recently they were telling adults with suspected ear infections to go to a pharmacy when pharmacies aren't in fact permitted to see this - pharmacies can only diagnose/prescribe for ear infection in under 18s.

I found this out the hard way and wound up at out of hours due to incredible pain after trying four pharmacies and eventually being told that the funding for pharmacy first didn't cover ear infections in adults and so no matter how many pharmacies I drove round none of them would see me.

My GP practice did then amend what they say on askMyGP, I didn't complain but the person I saw at Minor Injuries asked my GP practice and made clear he was not impressed.

Another positive view of the new system from me. The questions can be a bit annoying if your issue isn't anything that fits the right box to tick. But otherwise I have found it much easier to get a response.

I hated the previous "ring at 8 and sit in a queue for 40.mins." It was difficult to manage with school runs and work for us, and totally unfair on anyone who absolutely can't make calls from work like nurses or bus drivers.