My doctor doesn't "do female problems"

[Polkadotbikinininii]

Phoned to book a Dr's appointment for my daughter about her periods. After going through triage with the receptionist (for literally 10mins) I was told that the Dr who is on this week "doesn't do female problems" and I need to phone back next week to make an appointment with a different doctor. I can't book that appointment today though.

Can you imagine a female dr deciding she doesn't want to deal with problems potentially affecting half the population?!

On the other hand, at least he won't be dismissive or try to mansplain

Absolutely disgusting! I hope you get your daughter seen soon!! Even with being seen (GP’s, gynaecologists etc) Took me 20 years to get a diagnosis of endometriosis. It’s not normal to have heavy, painful periods but they keep gaslighting women into believing it is 😥 keep fighting xx

"We wanted an appointment today because she was off school (due to a hospital appintment for a different matter) so it seemed sensible to do everything on the same day. As it is, she'll need to take more time off next week for this appointment."
I get why you would want to take advantage of a day off school - I would too - but in our GP practise asking for a same day appt to discuss an issue with periods just would not happen as it same day appts are left for urgent matters. Unless of course she had something urgent related to her period rather than it being a convenience thing for you/her re school.

At ours you phone up on the day for gp appointments that day. They don't have many future appointments. This is why I couldn't book next week.
It's a weird and very inconvenient system.
They do offer out of normal hours appointments eg after 4 but these get booked up weeks in advance. If I wanted one of those it would have been end of April.

Receptionists taking calls where patients relay symptoms in order to be triaged for a Doctors call is farcical

I had a similar experience when I was younger. Had 2 different GPs refuse to refer me for a termination of pregnancy due to religious reasons. I was young and naive, didn't have any support to come with me and didn't realise they should have referred me to someone that was willing to help. I now realise I was probably early enough for a medical abortion but ended up having to go the surgical route by the time I managed to get an appointment with one who was happy to refer. I work in healthcare now and this is absolutely wild to me. The patient gets what care they need regardless of my personal views, it's not the time or place.

Please complain- this outrageous

Maybe she is having training, its a process so doesn't magically happen overnight. Not sure what that has to do with understanding the meaning of the word general, the receptionist isn't a general anything as far as we know, she's just a receptionist.

Back in the real world you often have to wait a week or longer to see a GP, if it's an emergency you need to be seen or referred to A&E but the OP doesn't say it was an emergency so seeing the doctor who specialises in the issue isn't a bad thing.

Lets be honest if the receptionist had said the doctor on this week doesn't deal with arthritis/gastric problems/skin problems but the doctor who deals with those issues will be in next week no one would think it was an issue. Being able to be indignant about women and girls makes it an issue not having a doctor with specialisms.

Unfortunately this makes care very unsafe - it means staff are required to look after more patients than is safe as colleagues won't. God knows they won't give you extra staff (as there never are any)
If HCPs are unable to put aside their personal feeling and beliefs in order to treat patients compassionately then they need to leave their profession and work somewhere it isn't an issue.
I actually got the impression that there was quite a bit of laziness involved actually - a woman having a medical termination especially can need quite a high intensity of care and things can go wrong quite quickly - it was easier for some to say it was a 'matter of conscience' and get out of it 🙄

The patient. Which means if he can’t treat half the population he needs training.

The whole point of GPs is that they oversee our whole health picture and refer to specialist services when needed. They should understand enough about all aspects of health to treat what they can and refer what they can’t. Menstruation effects half the population and they should absolutely be capable of addressing issues.

Honestly I would put in a formal complaint about this. What if it was something urgent like an ectopic pregnancy!!

Sorry I would be equally concerned actually probably more so. The whole point of general practice is it that it is everything if an individual HCP has religious or other beliefs which prevent them offering contraception or termination of pregnancy they are still obligated to provide referral to someone who does in a timely manner. I bet the other doctors are pretty fed up with his attitude and might actually be glad to get rid of the lazy **. If the practice runs a duty doctor of the week system which is what it sounds like passing on a big chunk of the work to the poor mug who is working the shift the following week is simply unfair on his colleagues and totally unacceptable for the patient

This whole situation sucks. I think it’s fair enough to have two GPs who cover different specialties, but they should have a better system to cover each other if someone is off sick/ on holiday. If temporary cover can’t be arranged, and the GP isn’t confident treating a particular issue, I think the patient should be able to book an appointment straight away for when the specialist is back, not have to join the queue again where they risk being overtaken by someone who could have been treated this week or has a less serious issue.

I think the specialist argument is a reach in this case though, it sounds like the GP doesn’t think women’s issues are worthy of his time and a complaint is definitely warranted.

Quite the opposite. It means you listen to the girl who would rather discuss her period problems with a woman.

Certainly seems like a bit of an oversight in a practice with only two doctors.

But that isn’t what’s happened here. Girl wants to talk to a doctor and the doctor has said ‘nope, don’t do girl stuff, soz, you’ll have to wait.’ It not acceptable however you look at it.

Appalling
It's 2025
Taliban esque

Funny that you still put in principles above the wishes of an individual girl.

Which individual girl? How? I think you aren’t understanding what I’ve said. The patient should be able to choose where possible. The doctor should be able and willing to see anyone with a few exceptions but certainly not based on biological sex of the patient.

As I've said numerous times...

• I've no idea whether the dr next week is female.
• The receptionist didn't say "dr next week is better to deal with that / has a special interest" or anything like that. She said this week's dr doesn't deal with that. That's a subtle but big difference. It was about THIS dr, not next week's Dr.
• we were never asked about my daughter's preference. For the record, she didn't care.

Hilariously the news this morning is reporting a need for better health care for women and girls. One of the proposals was to have a specific doctor in every surgery who will deal with women's health issues. Looks like the OPs surgery was doing the right thing.

@Balloonhearts I'm late to respond but that story made me wheeze-laugh

Posts are often seeded before a news story on Mumsnet.

You really notice it if you've been here a while.

Just like you notice ones where people are clearly being paid to push a point of view. There's a very clear example of this on the minerals in Greenland thread at the moment.

It's all very well to have a specialist but no matter how hilarious you find it, this isn't what happened in this instance. What happened was a male GP refusing to treat female medical issues.

The surgery were absolutely not doing the right thing as they didn't offer an alternative to the patient . They didn't say, come in and see a specialist, they just said call back

It was just another barrier to female health care.

For example in Leeds at the moment, if you want a coil you have to ring a health centre in Beeston. Doesn't matter that you can be on the far side of the city and it might take you two or three buses to get there. That's inconvenient but the only way to get an appointment is to ring at 8.30 am every morning and hope there's a spot. Then somehow juggle time off work, childcare, and transport before having a painful invasive procedure with no anesthetic.

If you look at the reviews of the Leeds Sexual Health clinic where the procedure is they are shameful.

People always minimise the barriers women face. I will believe the specialist female healthcare promise on the day I can ring my surgery and actually book it.

In the interim I'm self funding any care of that type as NHS provision is so poor.

That’s so stupid. Why not just skill up ALL doctors to deal with health difficulties effecting 50% of the population. Relying on one member of staff holding the expertise is not sustainable- they go on long term sick leave or leave the post and you lose the expertise. How infuriating.