Surely this can’t be right?

[adlibby]

My DC 5 has recently been diagnosed with celiac disease after almost a year of suffering some very nasty symptoms.

The GP was adamant the entire time that his being so unwell was not related to anything dietary.

After numerous visits I insisted on being referred to a paediatrician, after spending half of Christmas in A&E due to him being in terrible pain and unable to eat or drink, whereupon he was diagnosed with celiac disease after a few tests.

DS now needs to be on a special school meal plan which requires a stamp from his GP. I contacted the surgery and have been told they’ll only stamp the documents if I pay £50.

I didn’t know this was a thing. I understand for passports etc. but this is in relation to a diagnosed medical condition.

AIBU to this is pretty poor

It is poor but sadly it’s more common now - “letters” to “prove health conditions” - would the paediatric service do it for free - hospital services are a bit different to GPs who are effectively self employed businesses.

Wow! YANBU at all - very poor from the GP and practice. They should have tested much sooner, the least they can do is provide the diagnosis via a free stamp

Yes. That seems to be their standard charge for anything outside medical appointments.

Mine charged £85 to sign a passport application.

£50 is for them to sign/stamp anything because they class it as "private work". Even relating to medical conditions

Which is ridiculous

It's common. I had to pay £38 recently to get a very basic form completed, signed and stamped. It took 5 months to get it done in the end. I had to keep chasing it, and then return it as they hadn't actually stamped it!

But £50 for a child is unreasonable.

They're lazy and money grabbing. Most of them can't diagnose a common cold. They shouldn't be charging for a child. I'll add morally bankrupt along with my other criticisms.

presumably you have a consultant letter with the diagnosis and need for gluten free diet.

photocopy that and send that into to school as ‘proof’ of his needs. it is more than adequate.

if they want a gp stamp then school can pay for it.

Bureaucracy gone mad.

Your paediatrician would do it for free, ask their secretary.

Your poor DS. Have you checked what the special meal plan is and whether your son will like what’s served? My DD’s school wouldn’t cater gf for her coeliacs disease but my niece’s school served her jacket potatoes and beans EVERY day!

This is completely disgraceful - a passport is one thing but charging for something which contributes to his medical care is something else. I would get in touch with the practice manager and complain about being charged especially in light of the delayed diagnosis which you are also complaining about. The PM is of course employed by the practice and is there to claim lots of money for them and protect them against patients. When you get no joy there, complain to your local Integrated Care Board about the delayed diagnosis and the charge. Both complaints will use up far more time than it would take the admin staff to stamp the form.

But much better ideas above about using free consultant’s letter.

Yes same thing happened when my daughter had a medical problem 10 years ago.
Something that was diagnosed by a blood test but it took three years going backwards and forwards to the GP’s for them to diagnose it.
They are all just greedy grabbing bastards trying to fleece their patients. It’s all about the money now; it’s been a long time since anyone went into the health service wanting to do good.

Yes just use the Consultant's clinic letter.

What I thought would be a relatively straightforward part of this whole saga has proven to be anything but unfortunately.

The lovely school nursing team are now involved and is doing their best but the GP practice manager is adamant about the charge.

The catering company who supply the meals, which to be fair look nice, cannot accept the letter on its own so we’re hoping they’ll accept the nurses stamp instead.

DS paediatrician and his secretary are on annual leave!

I just wanted to get him on the list and back to some type of normality. Making gluten free packed lunches every day is also costing me an absolute fortune!

But surely the catering company have to take some blame here for being so bureaucratic. That is a ridiculous price for the GP surgery to charge but if every body needs a form stamped and signed by the GP you can see why they might try to discourage it.

I can’t see why you need a gp stamp - surely a consultants letter ‘top trumps’ a gp letter…

they seem to imposing some extremely stupid rules over this - when a consultants letter and common sense should be more than sufficient.

are you on free school meals? when mine were little we were - as low earners / disabled etc and £50 was our food budget for the week - I couldn’t have paid this fee - just didn’t have access to that kind of unmitigated expense.

Really hope you get it sorted.

Do you have a Coeliac specialist nurse? Can they sign it?
Or your paediatrician?

Off topic, but, are you getting the GF prescription food? My colleague's husband is coeliac and she said it ended up being better to get GF flour on prescription rather than bread as it made much more bread so lasted a lot longer.

That is, of course, if you have the time amongst everything else going on in family life, to make bread!

Unfortunately the borough we live in doesn’t provide celiac prescriptions so we’ve started buying gluten free everything but I’ve been shocked by the price of tbh.

£2.50 for a small packet of biscuits when a “normal” larger packet is 80p!!

I’ve been doing a lot of baking with gluten free flour. Hopefully we’ll all be better off for the new regime!