GP didn’t call me because their “workday has ended”

[angelinlothian]

I had a telephone call booked in at 15:40.

It rolls around and no call. 17:30 comes and goes which is when the surgery closes.

I get a text to say it’s not been completed as they got to the end of their workday and couldn’t make the call, which means at least 8 people were in the same position as me, they didn’t have their calls made.

So I now have to compete again tomorrow for an on the day call, and even having one booked in doesn’t guarantee it!

AIBU to think this is exactly why so many people end up in A&E? We’re told to go to our GP, but our GP won’t see us!

I agree with @CactusSwoonedEnding they simply can’t give the 8 people who didn’t get a call today appointments tomorrow as they don’t know who needs to be triaged for what tomorrow

i'm sure if you put on the triage form what happened today it will be taken into consideration or try 111

i would be annoyed they didn’t let you know sooner though

Oh and I felt bad as I was at a same day appointment in November. Already running 40 mins late. I went in and was sent for same day surgery for potential sepsis

I wasn’t even allowed to go home and get a charger or anything. The Drs spent an hour assessing me and arranging my admission for my emergency surgery

as I was going out people were giving the receptionist a really bad time. I felt so bad people shouldn’t do this. It really was life threatening timing for me. Stuff happens

Haven't been too impressed with doctors today. My mum had some tests done in late october. She was wondering what was happening and in January she got to know that the results have arrived in early November but she was instructed to wait till the doctor contacts her. She called the doctor today to ask about the results and was told off for not being patient enough (pun intended).

Sorry, a bit off topic. But yeah, doctor not contacting and expecting to redo the whole thing tomorrow really sucks.

Not true.

I’d be dropping the Practice manager an email and say you’re putting in a formal complaint.

You should automatically have your appointment rescheduled for a time that suits, not told to start the 8.00am appointment lottery again.

I think if GP surgeries got billed for people using A and E when their GP wouldn’t see them, appointments would soon be found.

I remember in France I had an XRay done during the appt at GP surgery!

Meanwhile here GPs are sitting there googling your symptoms with you 😵‍💫

I genuinely don't know what the point in GP surgeries are any more. It's bloody impossible to see anyone.
Everyone I know, including myself, has several awful stories of trying for weeks just to get an answer on the phone, never mind to be seen or spoken to.

I can think of one profession in which employees are expected to put in at the very least around 2/3 hours overtime every day and also to work at weekends and over holidays!
So pleased I left 😀

I agree, and I think if you’ve had a job where you really can’t just leave, you have less sympathy for the GP in this situation. I’ve done one of those jobs. It was basically out of my hands what time I finished, it was all I could do to sneak a phone call to DH to make sure he could pick up if it turned into a late one. Think court-based. If I hadn’t had DH to rely on, I’d have had to identify someone else and make arrangements with them. Failing that, come to some different working arrangements. The responsibility in some jobs is too great to just go home.

Unfortunately not everyone can just add another hour to their working day.
If kids need picked up they need picked up. Before afterschool shut.

Questions is why did they have more people booked in than they had time for.
Why are those people not priority for the morning

This is why people need to pay to see their GP.

In Australia I pay to see my GP. I can get a Medicare Urgent Care GP for a free walk-in appointment over the weekend or late at night. The Medicare GP’s are free. You don’t have to wait long. The government did this because there are too many people showing up to hospitals for minor things - but also because we have had rapid immigration and our hospitals can’t cope.

We also have private emergency hospitals which I have used many times in the past.

If I have a UTI I can see a pharmacist for a consult and get antibiotics. Pharmacists can also write medical certificates. I don’t have to see a GP first. Some nurses can also prescribe antibiotics and the contraceptive pill.

The NHS needs a massive overhaul. I once asked a person from the UK if the NHS model was sustainable for the future and he absolutely screamed at me. Apparently British people don’t want to have to pay to see a GP.

I basically no longer have a doctor. The phone lines for appointments are open from 8 to 8.30 and are always engaged . The last time I tried I couldn't get through. They don't allow in person booking.

What difference is paying to see a GP going to make?
Its not going to create more appointments
Its only going to mean people who are financially sensitive will put of seeing a GP.
Those on benefits will get it free. Those just over the threshold won't.

Hospital once said - we think we have her in time - I was so close to cancelling the GP appointment that lead to me going to hospital in first place. A week before I re-emerged out of hospital

Sorry @angelinlothian, but I have only read your OP.

My MiL was - by her own choice - living in a (hospital) bed in her lounge, rather than in a nursing home. She had carers coming in 4 times a day, for both domestic and health care reasons, plus her amazing niece, my DH's cousin, checking up on her almost daily.

Unfortunately we, husband and I, lived 5 to 6 hours away by car, and had our own heath problems, so we couldn't visit all that often, but would stay for about a week in a hotel each time we came to see her. The carers were in daily contact with her niece as she lived locally, and is one of the few people in life who truly cares for others. We owe her so much, but will sadly, and probably, never be able to repay her, in any meaningful way, which we feel very guilty about.

Anyway, the carers told her that MiL was deteriorating quite rapidly, so we rang her Dr - this was earlier in 2019, several months before we became aware of Covid 19 - and I asked the doctor to visit my MiL urgently, that day. This was at about 11.00am, but the doctor, who knew all about my MiL's illnesses, and that she was so disabled and ill that she was bedbound, said he couldn't fit in a visit to her that day, even though she was in terrible pain. So I asked him to go in his lunch hour as it was so urgent, but he replied "what about my lunch?", which is when I lost it, although I managed not to swear or shout, but I did tell him that my MiL was a very old - which he already knew - and very ill lady, who was in a lot of pain, so he could either go without his lunch for once, or eat a sandwich in his car on the way to see her! He went. As well as upping her morphine, he realised that we, her family, had also been right that she needed to go onto end of life care, which meant she also had a night nurse at last.

I was the one who talked to the doctors etc, as I had some kind of medical background, and I could be - normally - quietly insistant. Also, my husband asked me to do it, I wouldn't have just taken over from him! Again, as a family, we were very glad for MiL's sake, that she died before Covid 19 was much more than just a rumour.

I am in my late 60s now OP, and can remember that as recently as 2018 I still had the same family doctor that I had seen in our multi doctor practice for the last 30+ years. He knew, and had been the doctor for, all my children as well. How has so much changed in under 10 years, and so much for the worse? I'm very sorry that you are now also a victim of this awful crumbling national health service, that was once envied by so much of the world. So I don't think you are being at all unreasonable @angelinlothian.

Hopefully, without sounding condescending, I can say here that younger women might not realise that once upon a time, and not actually that long ago in reality, GPs had ethics and morals, and they would have never put such an early home time before their patients who needed them! They were, and presumably still are, given a salary that reflected their now, apparently gone, work ethic, and their genuine care for their patients. I do hope that you get the help you need very soon now, OP. 💐

I do expect them too! I work in a patient facing role and we work until the job is done and the people we need to see have been seen and sorted. That does mean multiple late nights every single week where appointments overrun or we are delayed for one reason or another. It’s simply not ok to not provide adequate care. It’s part of the job and part of what those of us who work in the health care sector sign up to.

You sound dumb and uneducated

You are asking doctors to work to the point of burnout, to not leave work on time, and potentially not even get paid for this extra work. Not all GPs are salaried. They may be paid on a hourly basis with only X hours permitted ie they can’t charge infinitely.

You do realise that when doctors are overworked and not able to take a break, the quality decreases? So how do you expect mistakes to not be made due to stress, if they are expected to stay daily 2-3 hours late? You do realise, humans perform worse under work related stress? You want to put your life in the hands of someone tired, stressed, distracted, overworked and expect perfection?

Why hasn’t your mind gone to, they need to hire more staff? Or they need to book LESS patients in with the current amount of staff? Why is your solution to do more, with less staff? Your opinion is illogical. There is obviously a resourcing issue.

The population of my city hasn't increased since pre-Covid. The number of doctors at the practice hasn't decreased.

I walk past the surgery morning and evening. It has ridiculous glass walls so you can see who's waiting. Pre Covid might have been full. Now 2 people at most.

They now don't allow appointments to be booked other than the brief period in the morning and only by phone, which is engaged.

So you’re saying with absolute certainty that every single person who has died in the last 5-6 years has been replaced by exactly 1 baby leading the population to be exactly the same or less in 2026? What’s your evidence of this rare phenomenon as it’s not statistically likely?

and what’s your evidence there’s no other pressures on GP practices ie more reliance on healthcare than there was 5 years ago? Conditions that have deteriorated, new onset old age conditions, more baby care for the children? Why are you making the assumption that the demand has stayed the same or not increased? It goes without saying that some appointments take longer than others and require more consideration.

or are you just throwing out unfounded nonsense statements?

What a daft reply. Are you just throwing out unfounded nonsense?

Population of Edinburgh 2019 approx 531,000. Population of Edinburgh 2024 approx 530,680.

Open my mind a bit? What do you mean?

Because I don't think a GP should have to "work till they are finished" every day? Yes, lots of jobs require unpaid overtime, but it's generally not every day and/ or you can manage your deadlines etc to some extent OR you are very well paid. I am not naive to that. I just don't think that that means that all GP's should have working hours that essentially are entirely fluid, and with no certainty as to finish time ever, in case there is a medical emergency or other delay. These are people too, and while well paid they aren't being paid millions to be at their patients beck and call 24/7 for non-emergencies. They have the right to make out of work commitments too.

I do however think that the call should have been automatically rescheduled with priority for the next day.

Ethics and morals don't collect children!

People forget that GPs have lives. Back in the day they possibly didn't also have a working spouse.

I have to give the GP the benefit of the doubt that they needed to be somewhere. Most nurseries and afterschools close at 6pm.

The question is why are they booking more people in than they have time for and why not automatically rebook for the morning

You have a disabled son and are therefore presumably very knowledgeable about his condition. You had already spoken to his consultant who had advised that a referral to Orthotics was required, but those referrals need to come via the GP.

What else other than a referral were you expecting from the GP?

Presumably you had put in the online form that you had already spoken to consultant? The GP isnt going to override that - the call would have just been to confirm your convo with the orthotics centre, dot the i's and cross the t's to enable them to submit the referral. Its actually a much more efficient way of working.

It's not what you should sign up for though. A healthcare professional burning out, risking, exhausted is also not providing adequate care.

We can't expect individual workers to prop up a broken system. And if people did stop doing all the extra time they are doing the system would break and it would be forced to change.

I was in healthcare and I left for this very reason. It wasn't my job to to do the work of people who weren't there - and they weren't there because they hadn't been employed because it was expected we'd all just do extra.

Which presumably means more older people. Older people with more complex health needs. Requiring more GP time and appointments.

We also know more GPs are women, women with children, women who work part-time because of the children, women who need to collect children.
Women are drawn to GP work because it avoids the antisocial hours of hospital work. And can fit in with family life better.

I can't believe how many people on here expect GPs to just work on. We have no idea what else that person had on, or what else they needed to do.

Which presumably means more older people. Older people with more complex health needs. Requiring more GP time and appointments.

This demographic existed in 2019. Since lock down the practice I'm registered with makes it as difficult as possible to get an appointment with a GP.

I'm so bored of the "but I'm a woman, I've got family" excuses