To think that if you cancel on the day with the NHS, you should be put to the bottom of the list?

[SaltAirAndTheRust]

Unless you have a good reason of course!

I’ve just started and I’m in my first week, in this week we’ve had multiple cancel due to nerves or just not turning up. Seeing the amount of work that gets them to this point, it’s staggering! I just can’t get my head around it

Ah yes, and you have seen the post service recently?

I once watched them print a cancellation letter and hand it to me - to cancel the appointment I was there for.

Other appointments had not arrived and apparently it's very easy to miss appointments if you don't know about them.

My mum has a couple of chronic conditions which involve quite a few medical appointments. She can’t drive any more so either me or my sister have to take annual leave to go with her.

The amount of times we’ve turned up only to find the appointment has been cancelled, usually with a letter sent out the previous day by second class post, or we’ve been kept waiting for anything up to 2 hours, or the necessary test results aren’t available meaning a wasted journey are many.

The NHS needs to sort itself out with regards to communication and perhaps stop treating patients as if they are being granted a huge favour by just being able to walk through the hospital door.

And don’t get me started on the extremely painful procedure my poor mum was put through with absolutely no communication or information from the medical team. She’s now too scared to go back to that department and I don’t blame her.

OP you are dealing with the most vulnerable and probably the most annoying people in society and so you are going to have to change your mind set or you are going to burn out quick.

I know it's frustrating when you see the problems with the NHS and how some people can abuse it, but it's a bit like a cleaner complaining about how disgusting people are or a police officer complaining about criminals doing criminal things - it's just part of the human condition unfortunately.

@SaltAirAndTheRust sometimes you get an appointment short notice. Being nervous is not easy. Also many health authorities have a two strikes and your out policy already

Youre a right pain in the bum, pedant much ?

@ Yelleryyeller - "Oh for goodness sake, I've asked you 3 times to specify what YOU are talking about and you are giving the most immature responses. E-referral is specific to England, other countries in the UK have their own specific digital services which are similar or almost identical. They don't manage ALL services though i.e. scans though which is why I asked what kind of appointments you can't book online just out of curiosity..."

Well what sort of appointments are you talking about?

I live in England and in the last year I've had OP hospital referrals to (1) a hand surgeon; (2) a consultant led eye clinic; (3) a consultant led urinary clinic; and (4) a foot x-ray.

At no time have I been told about an e-referral platform which would allow me to manage my own appointments.

How are patients meant to know?

Sometimes they arrive after the appointment.

I work for the NHS albeit in a small community team for quite a difficult to reach client group - so we do have a lot more flexibility to arrange appointments that mutually work with people, because it's the clinician ringing directly to arrange the appointment and as long as the work gets done and the clients get seen - our diaries are our own to manage.

We do get some awful pisstakers though - not so much the clients who are nervous of services and who we have to work harder to reach - possibly even meeting them in a cafe or something to get that initial rapport established, but the care providers who can tend to view us as their personal gofer service. We have a couple of care providers who would refer to ask the NHS to provide an Elastoplast if they could do, and also will regularly arrange appointments and you'll get there to find that they've just taken the client out cos it's a nice day and not bothered to let you know (and they have my work mobile number and email to contact me on!). They get annoying at times - but the joys of community work is that people are often not at home and off out in the community when you're wanting to see them.

I have a mental "two strikes and I'll have the conversation if you actually want the appointment" policy and will then run it by management to close the referral (our clients are very vulnerable so we do play it more cautiously in terms of trying to make sure people don't slip through the net). Certain care providers are absolutely diligent about keeping you informed, will ring you if someone is ill to see if you want to reschedule, will just be absolutely lovely... others - you can be down in the diary to do a lunchtime assessment of swallowing, arrive just at the agreed time and "oh we've given him his lunch already can you come back another day"

Such is the way of the world. You learn to let it go and not let it fester or it'll drive you mildly nuts.

As a new employee with the NHS, you likely received training what to do with cancellations or not turning up for an appointment.

Why posting on MN?

Why would someone be particularly nervous of a MRI scan?

They can trigger awful claustrophobia in some people.... some people who have never experienced it in any other settings before.
There was a thread on here a while ago about it. Some people are terrified of them.
And sometimes, it is not so much the actual procedure but the worry about results etc.

The whole appointment system needs revising. Letters sent that never turn up. Unsuitable times offered, like a pp said don’t just send appointment times out let people pick. Eg pensioners don’t want early slots as bus isn’t free then but workers like early slot to get out of way before work.
There’s also often no way of saying Dr told me not to come back for 6 months - the eye clinic badger my mum and threaten to discharge if she doesn’t accept apt so she does and dr says why are you here…
Lots could be done by text.

My mum got her first strike by being sent an appointment time she couldn't get to with a carer. Her second strike was because she was seriously ill in hospital. She was still in hospital when they rang to rebook so they rang me to say they've assigned her a random appointment which she now can't change or she will be auto discharged. If she's hospitalised again and can't make it she'll be discharged.

You imply that people who make no sense are perfect staff for the NHS; why?
Do you think surgeons, nurses, junior doctors and suchlike have no sense?

I get letters that arrive after the appointment date. Am I supposed to time travel?

'The NHS needs to sort itself out with regards to communication and perhaps stop treating patients as if they are being granted a huge favour by just being able to walk through the hospital door.'

NHS worker here, and I agree there is a lot of 'us and them'. I understand where it comes from, but it's not helpful

We do - but by that point, it was too late to get one.

This.

You'll be punishing the most vulnerable. If you don't care about that after one week, get a job somewhere it doesn't matter.

Where I live (Sweden) you must give 24 hours notice of not attending a medical appointment - it can be done via the telephone answerphone or via the app.

If you just don't turn up they charge you £30 as the appointment could have been offered to someone else.

Admin and NHS is pretty much a mess. I'm.under 2 different consultants currently at the same hospital. Their admin systems are totally different. One is totally on it and one I spend lots of time chasing around.

I do get the concern about people who don't go to appointments. My pathway would have been quicker if I could have had the appointments of those who didn't show up. And that pisses me right off, because with cancer, the quicker I'm treated the more likely I am to live. I get they are vulnerable and scared- I'm that very person.

My mum once got an appointment letter for the eye clinic. She'd been under the macular clinic for years, so I thought someone had made a mistake.

Couldn't get through to anyone to query it, so we turned up for the appointment anyway.

After going through the rigmarole of examinations and a consultation no one was clear why my mum had the appointment.

On checking, someone had mistakenly discharged her from the macular clinic, which triggered an appointment with the eye clinic.

She then had to be discharged from eye, and referred back to macular.

What a waste of time and resources. But that's what the NHS is best at, and it's a bit of a cheek to complain about patients when it can't get its own act together.

But at least my mum attended the appointment, eh!

Making no sense and having no sense are not the same thing.

I might agree if the NHS wasn't such a shambles eg text you to say you have an appointment, show up for said appointment, tell me they have no record of appointment, show them the text, get told no spaces available, sorry, so book another appointment, pharmacy calls asking why appointment not attended that they can see on their system but GP office couldn't....

1 example of many.

NHS is entirely too arrogant to be dictating anything to anyone if they don't handle their own business correctly. Soooooo.....YABU

DD lives in a care home. On the day of the appointment, they cancelled it, as apparently they didn’t have a driver. Personally, I would have sent her with a team leader or the house manager, because they all have to drive to get there! However, they didn’t.

How is it fair to penalise DD, who does not have capacity and cannot express herself articulately, for decisions made by people, outside of her control? (We live 3.5 hours drive away and only found all this out, after the event)

There should be a financial penalty. Graded by the persons income