To think there should be a way of reporting GP surgeries that don’t have online booking available from 8.00-6.30

[BurtsB33]

We were told by Wes Streeting that online booking would negate the morning rush, facilitate being able to get GP appointments and more importantly make booking easier. We were told all GP surgeries would now have this.

In reality like many our GP shuts online booking down early in the day. There is no other way to book. It’s far harder to contact our GP surgeries and to see a GP particularly if you work full time.

So if surgeries aren’t keeping to government promises and declaration of what is/ should be happening surely there should be a quick way of reporting them so the situation can be rectified.

@Frankiecat2 I agree, it certainly seems to be. And the sad thing is that the “consumers” (patients, parents) complain about the providers (GPs, teachers) , rather than targeting their anger at the real villains - the politicians, who promise the earth in order to get votes, with no knowledge of reality.

Teachers and doctors are expected to pull rabbits out of hats because someone in a smart suit with an expensive briefcase says they have to.

They don’t do it free of clinical parameters!

Well I have literally known GPs kill themselves through stress. And yet somehow I'm not pearl clutching that GPs are being called lazy and overpaid on this thread, just giving my POV.

Is it only teachers that aren't allowed to be criticised? If teachers complain about their GPs at work are they responsible for other peoples mental health?

Ridiculous comment. Teachers are no more stressed than NHS workers on average

As I always say on these threads, please can you put forward your management plan, to offer more appointments than we have capacity for. I will present it to my practice manager and we will put it in place immediately. But in 20 years on MN, reading GP bashing threads weekly, I have never seen anyone put forward a viable plan.

Obviously the people who are already on the list get seen first in their designated need( urgent/non) and those that can access the small window online booking is open will have to wait a bit longer, the same as those who can’t get through to online booking have to.

To be clear, they aren't laughing about them being suicidal (no one would ever do that) but at the self importance of teachers thinkjng they are more important and more stressed than everyone else

'I cant come to that appointment or ring at that time I have WORK' - so does everyone else!!

What changed in last few years? I used to be able to book appointments weeks in advance at any point of the day. I am now being told there are no advance appointments and I can only book one for the same day.
It won't affect any urgent issues if there are two stream, as I mentioned in my previous comment.
I get the issue of missed appointments (again, any other business would call up to confirm and have a cancellation list) if booked too far in advance but that shouldn't mean they are now not available at all.
Out specialist service is booked 6 months in advance, we don't close triage because of it. We have a main list, cancellation list and ad hock slots for anything urgent.

No actually I’d like the practice manager,partners and people further up in the NHS paid ££££ to sit down and own up to the fact online booking isn’t working in their surgery. Then I’d like them to think of a way to make some/ any kind of better system like other surgeries are managing to up and down the country because people being shut out of booking not long after systems open with no record of being on any list is absolutely not ok

GP’s know the system doesn’t work - they knew it never would as there aren’t enough appointments available for those who would like one.
Year on year GP’s are doing more appointments with less resources.

Maths should be taught better in schools as some posts illustrate.

And your evidence for this?Clearly that space is reserved for NHS staff of whom nobody is allowed to criticise when being given substandard service or care.

And the excuse re disgusting attitudes towards ND?

What disgusting attitudes are these? That some completely neurotypical people think they have a neurodiversity after watching tiktok, despite having a successful life including degree and job? I think you'll find that is a reflection on reality.

I have said literally nothing derogatory about people with neurodiversity. I suspect you have realised how wrong you are and are now trying to manufacture outrage by accusing me of ableism and belittling suicide, neither if which I have done. I'm certainly not going to be cowed by a silly witch hunt, I suggest you learn how to argue your point better and perhaps, have a good think about your points before voicing them.

It's not a ridiculous comment to say that GPs shouldn't be laughing at patients behind their backs because they're teachers. From your post: "'She's a teacher' said with a knowing look," "Please mention you are a teacher in your complaint, and mention it several times 😂"

You're the person playing stress olympics here. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of GPs mocking the stress of another profession (when they are meant to be treating these people! I'm sure nothing you described in your post fits in with the NHS values) when they themselves expect to have their stress taken seriously.

"If teachers complain about their GPs at work are they responsible for other peoples mental health?"

?! If the GP is already prejudiced about the patients before they even come in ("'She's a teacher' said with a knowing look,") then of course they're doing those patients a disservice. This comparison makes zero sense.

or to out it another way

'Oh yes I have disgusting attitudes towards neurodiversity - NOT!'
🤣

In fairness, there are a bunch of jobs where you can't make calls just whenever. EG care home workers, teachers, machine operators, workers on production lines, etc etc. A lot of office based jobs you have more time each day when you're not in a meeting etc. and you can squeeze in a quick call occasionally.

And it is unfair that in some surgeries you can make appointments any time of day, in others you can't - there should be better consistency.
Targets should be applied honestly , so you should never be in a position that bookings are closed to avoid appointments being issued for 2 months' time or a waiting list that spans weeks or months. It shouldn't be impossible for surgeries to phone patients to confirm that an appointment is still needed nearer the time. Yes, GP apps are usually way more urgent than that, but it's wrong that once they're booked for a fortnight ahead, it's "find help elsewhere" - there isn't anywhere else! At least we could then have clarity on GP waiting lists.

what do you expect them to do? Magic up extra staff and appointments? Once the clinic is full, it’s full. If they don’t have funding or space for extra staff to run more clinics that’s it. As an old boss of mine used to say-you can only fit a pint into a pint pot.

wait till you get to secondary care now that the ICBs have run out of money and are saying we can’t see or operate on patients from their area till April.

The problem is with health appointments the urgent need to jump the queue. And some people wanting an appointment really don’t need one at all. So it can’t be treated in the same ‘first come first serve, all applications are equal’ way. Most GPs are also working under capacity. If there is tons of demand for hair appointments that can’t be met, you can be pretty confident another salon will open up. Doctors surgeries are not nearly as easy to set up and we don’t have enough skilled labour to meet the needs…..

so you end up with an overstrained system, in which you need to constantly reassess priority of customers, and have virtually no capacity to meet no urgent needs ever.

it really isn’t like a hair salon. I know it’s awful for patients, and it needs to be fixed. But it’s not incompetence or laziness on the part of the provider.

No different from what some teachers think about their students and families

This is awful. Are you a medical professional? Pre-judging people and their symptoms based on their job... And 'none-provable pain' ? So if there isn't an outward sign or a test to prove it, patients are not to be believed when we say we're experiencing pain?

Someone I know tried to get an appointment online, over the phone and was told to go down to the surgery each day and queue up and if they had spaces that day they would give her an appointment. Several already in the queue before surgery opened and only 2 appointments given. Rest told to return the next day

I didn't say that GPs are the NHS. I said that the cause is the NHS. Who commission GPs to provide NHS care. So if you want to access NHS care via a GP, and the NHS isn't able to fund more appointment slots, then it's the NHS you would be complaining to.

And before someone says, then that means the GPs need to provide better services if the NHS is paying for it! I'm a taxpayer!! The NHS is getting exactly what they pay for, based on what government funding they receive.

As I thought. You don’t have a solution.

Like I’ve said OP, as a GP of 30 years I have sat in hundreds of hours of meetings (in my own unpaid time, might I add) trying to find ways to meet the increasing demand without increasing the supply (because there’s no money).

Over the years we’ve stretched ourselves to the limit trying to employ more staff. In fact, once we (the GP partners) paid ourselves nothing for 3 months, to try and balance the books and fund more hours.

We’ve modified the ratio of pre-bookable vs on-day appointments, we’ve tried telephone triage, online booking, we’ve employed nurse practitioners, clinical pharmacists, we’ve built an extension into our car park to create more consulting rooms, we’ve employed more doctors, we’ve reduced our annual leave, we’ve got home log in so we can catch up on admin in evenings and at weekends (unpaid obviously) . But the demand goes up and up, and we can never meet it. Never. And we’re not allowed to close our list.

It’s easy for people like you to say “you’re paid enough money, get it sorted”, but even if I was paid £1,000,000 per hour I still couldn’t see more patients.

I’m sorry that you don’t understand this, because it reminds me that my lifetime of bloody hard graft is still seen as insufficient by some people.

I’ve got a feeling that this is Reform’s high level Health Policy.

But if there's no appointments left all the phone lines in the world and fancy online portals won't make any difference?!

Thank you for all you have done.

I always think GPs are the 'Mums' of the NHS. The ones who do all the work in the background, show up every day and are there for people when they really need them and when they don't. And like Mums, this massive workload isn't noticed or recognised, until it's gone and people realise what they have lost.

🌷