GP surgery phoned wrong person but made out me and DH are liars

[nextwed14]

I had a couple of missed calls from my GP surgery today which was odd as I haven't contacted them at all recently. They called again at 5pm and they asked to speak to my son when I explained he was at school they said his dad had contacted them and booked a phone appt for 1130 but they couldn't get hold of his dad on the number given so they were contacting me.

I said that it wasn't my husband who called and that my son is well and at an after school club. They had my sons name and dob and said that they definitely had a call regarding him this morning. I double checked with my DH and he hadn't called so I called the surgery back and said we definitely hadn't contacted them. DH then phoned to say he hadn't contacted them and receptionist said that he definitely called them this morning and an appointment was given but my DH didn't answer his phone. They made out that myself and my husband were liars and that we were wasting NHS resources by now deciding that there was no problem. They must have muddled my son up with someone else but I don't know how as his name is quite unusual and I dont think there would be 2 people with the same name and DOB. I don't know if I should take it further or just leave it. Who ever did phone has obviously not had an appt for their child as they had the totally wrong contact details for them

In re PP: at our GP practice 16 yo and over HAVE to deal with the practice themselves, unless they have signed proxy forms allowing parents (or others) to do soon their behalf.

any chance that DS pretended to be dad making an appt for his son? [grasping at straws but I have a son a similar age and weirder things have happened]

I would contact the practice manager formally. They need to know. They will be able to listen back to the tapes and see who called. I raised a complaint recently about a message not being passed on and they were able to listen to a conversation 3 months earlier : and arranged for some extra training for the receptionist as a result ….really glad I followed it through.

I did wonder that - about OP's son contacting them. But wouldn't the missed calls then show up on son's phone?

GP employee here. This can happen - but shouldn't. Everyone is human and makes mistake. Results or correspondence were probably filed to an incorrect patient. It shouldnt happen but it does.

This is a massive GDPR error. Flag it to the practice manager so a learning event can be raised.

If it is the fact your son doesnt want to tell you something it is still GDPR as he is over 16 so needs dealing with.

This is hilarious 😆

Please write to the practice manager OP. I’ve had something similar happen- gp appointment call for someone else and it wasn’t until I spoke to the practice manager about it that something was done!

I recently had three unexpected voicemails left from my GP and when I called them back to find out why , they said it it was regarding my morning after pill request. I had not made a morning after request and have no need to as not sexually active, I explained this to the receptionist who said the GP still needed to speak to me, when I spoke to her to reiterate what I had said she just said ‘well, I better work out who needs the morning after pill then’ this was at 4.45pm on a Friday afternoon so I wished her good luck.

I have a medical exemption from paying prescription charges. I completed the renewal form given to me at the surgery and gave it to the receptionists. Several weeks later I received a letter saying they could not accept a photocopied form and when I rung the GP receptionist she said I must have photocopied it before sending it! I explained that I did not leave the surgery with the form so that wasn’t possible.

Definitely get in touch with the practice manager......
I'm intrigued, a 16 year old at an after school club 🤔

I had this with the dentist recently. They messaged to confirm date and time. I turned up at 3.15 to be told the appointment was for 2.15 I was an hour late and the dentist wouldn't see me. That evening I checked my messages, blow me the message said clearly 3.15. I took a screenshot and emailed them explaining their mistake. Never got an apology.

Are you absolutely sure he’s not got a mate to phone pretending to be DF and make him an appointment for something he doesn’t want you to know about, for example an STD?

I'm intrigued, a 16 year old at an after school club 🤔

Loads of secondary schools have clubs after school!

How odd, I had this scenario recently. I’d not left the surgery though as I had to wait for someone else.

After they had told me loudly in front of everyone that I was late and missed the appt, they told me (much more quietly) that it was the computer’s mistake 🤣

Was it on the home phone?

But if the DS had made the appt, surely he would have picked a time when he was actually available to have it, and not given his dad’s phone number!

More likely the surgery made an error somehow

And why shouldn’t a 16yo do an after-school club?

This is the thing. When I saw the title of the thread I felt sorry for whoever made the mistake, but then their hostile attitude (to deflect blame I suppose) isn't OK so a complaint is justified.

No 16 year old boy in the history of the human race has ever made his own GP appointment.

This made me laugh.
And, as a dentist I can confirm that most (men of all ages, even when they are married!) tend to get their mums to make their appointments 😂

He is adamant he hasn't phoned them and is quite happy to make a complaint - because he isn't happy either that his record is going to have information about another child on it.

The only other thing I can think is a mate could have played a prank on him but why and how I don't know. I don't actually think any of his mates would even know which surgery we are at - as it isn't one of the 2 local ones to us.

He goes to football training at school after school twice a week!

I appreciate mistakes happen. What shouldn't happen are the disgraceful, reductive and poor attitudes too often experienced from GP receptionists and some of the GPs. In reality, I imagine the GP's don't care and don't have much more respect. If they did the conduct would be dealt with.

Last time I was in hospital there was someone behind the next curtain who'd been given someone else's heart medication by a pharmacy, taken it and had a heart attack/some kind of cardiac event. I never found out what happened to them but the reason I knew was various medical staff kept on walking past and recounting the story in shocked tones of voice.

what, you think extra-curricular activities stop at age 11? It's a club he does after school, why would that need an age limit?

the amount of shit sherlocks on here does make me laugh...

Make a complaint to the practice manager and raise concerns both about the way the receptionist spoke to you and possible GDPR issues. I'd be very surprised if the calls aren't recorded.

I recently changed to DHs GP who reading my notes from the old surgery states she found it harf to believe I'd ever been in the category of 'morbidly obese.' Whoever had written my weight down in 2014 literally mixed up kg with lbs. Anyway, I got offered the covid vaccines earlier than others, could never work out why- think i know now?!

Pacemaker implantation - sedation and IV ABs to be administered. Three times I'd been asked about allergies and told them penicillin (anaphylaxis), and my file had an alert on it. Guess what they almost used, asking me at the very last minute for the fourth time about allergies...lots of rushing about, panicpanic...luckily by then I was pretty mellow.

I would writer a formal letter and request they check their records to ensure the receptionists will contact the correct person in future.

In 2021 our GPs prescribed dh an extreme blood thinner, used for high risk prevention surgery patients to prevent thrombosis. This drug is only ever prescribed for bed bound or hospitalised patients as the risk of serious internal bleeding is very real, just from a minor car accident or trip or fall.

Dh is a builder.

He had a medication review and the item just appeared on his prescription. He takes aspirin and various other medication for high BP, chloresterol etc so assumed it was just a new one to take based on his review. Don't forget this was covid times so review happened over the phone.

Anyhow, about 10 months later the (new) pharmacist pulled me when I went to collect prescription to query why he was taking it, when was his operation as had been on them too long. Wouldn't let me leave with them and by the time I got home 10 mins later dh had had 3 missed calls from GP.

Anyway long story short there is another patient with same name as DH, but different dob. Mix up with adding medications on. Profuse apologies from surgery and reassurance it would never happen again.

18 months later I got a phone call (we give my number for dhs as he can never answer phone) saying his dressings were ready. Dh was currently on a building site, had not ordered any dressings and turns out it had intact happened again. I rang back to speak to practice manager, who said no one had called me at all! I ended up emailing them screenshot of my call log I was so cross.

So things like this absolutely happen and staff absolutely lie.

I argued for 5 mins with a nurse practitioner that she had the wrong Fred Smith as mine was definitely not in need of any dressings. Asked her to check the dob and postcode was dhs and she hung up on me.

I had to go for emergency blood tests because my GP put someone else tests results on my record. I had had blood test results months before, all fine, but then they rang in a huge panic. They said there had been a "mistake at the lab" but didn't give any details. So I go and have the blood tests and again all fine. I did, briefly have sight of the test results because they were, on my record and the results were a bit worrying, I could see why they had rung me. Weirdly about three months later I was in the chemist and they called out my name to get my prescription. As I went towards the counter another lady did too. Same name as me.