to really have it in for GP's surgeries...

[mersmam]

Had an appointment with my community midwife today (I'm 30 weeks pregnant and haven't seen her since I was 16 weeks, which was when she made the appointment.)
Got to the drs surgery to find it locked and a notice up saying that the surgery is closed this afternoon for staff training! As far as I'm aware there has been no attempt to contact me about this! I rang the midwife's office straight away but could only leave a message and have so far had no response.
Am really annoyed as have arranged my whole day around the appointment (and DH had arranged to work from home so he could come too).
Generally I am just sick of the whole GP system - I can never get an appointment at a convenient time - when I do I always have to wait at least half an hour (no joke with three DCs under 5) and the staff on reception are rude.
I asked for a home visit once as I was ill along with all the DCs and you'd think I'd asked for the moon...

The thing with the midwife today feels like the final straw...

Should I change surgeries to somewhere further away (which would be less convenient?) or are they all like this?

no they're all shite - I didn't get placed with a local hospital (I dont count an hour away at best local) cos they cocked up.. and completely agree re the waiting time (I accept some wait but I've had to wait anything between 25 - 60 minutes). And there must be a special place they find the reception staff..

but am not surprised you're jopping mad -how shit is that to not tell you

Thanks poppy! It annoys me further that the midwife hasn't even bothered to call back (I rang her at 1.30 when my appointment was supposed to be). I'm wondering if there is anyone official I can complain too... might try the prime minister

ah that I can help you with - your local pct wil have someone you can complain to.

Will check it out poppy - thanks.

That's patently unprofessional. It's a joke that in surgeries and clinics there are always posters about how much the NHS loses through people not cancelling their appointments, yet they treat patients like this.

You should be able to complain to the Practice Manager as well as the PCT as Poppy suggested.

Can you transfer mw as well?

Theres a new thing at our drs - you have to book in via a computer, thats ok for those who can do it- but listening while a snotty nosed recepionist yells instructions to a dear old lady is just too much grrrrrrrrrrrr.

Funnily enough as soon as I got up to help the elderly lady the receptionist became very kind grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

so if you have to wait on the fone 20 mins to make an appointment, you have to book yourselves in and the dr calls you when its yout turm -what are the receptionists doing???????-and WHY do they ask you for detailed symptoms and then say ' I dont know youd better see the Dr?'.

Are you with my GP practice, it is the sort of stunt that they would pull.

I will be complaining to them tomorrow - but have the feeling they will treat me with a sneer as that is the normal first line defence attitude of the reception staff there!! I'm terrible at being assertive but am looking for some mumsnet support to make me feel all fired up and justified

Transferring midwives would mean going to a different surgery which is going to be pretty inconvenient for me

It's a joke that in surgeries and clinics there are always posters about how much the NHS loses through people not cancelling their appointments,

Have you ever tryed to cancel an appointment - you cant get through for over half an hour on the telephone to talk to someone to cancel an appointment - by which time your appointmnet has come and gone!!

Do you know why doctors receptionists are generally regarded as rude? It's because every day they have sick and/or obnoxious people ringing them up or appearing at their desk - in a constant stream. GP practices are under pressure and that falls on the admin and managerial staff just as much as it does the medical staff.

Of course you should have been contacted today - but have you taken the trouble to keep your GP up to date with your phone numbers or expected (like most of the patients I deal with) that they will just 'know' it by some magical process.

Home visits - generally are not available to able bodied younger people. You are either well enough to arrange a babysitter and struggle to the surgery or you need an ambulance to a&e - not a home visit from a GP with a list of seriously ill and housebound people to get to.

Convenient time - GPs want to work standard working hours the same as anybody else so there will be a limit on the number if appointments at times you regard as 'convenient'.

Waiting - you wait because your Gp got back late from house calls (see above), has had to see patients insisting on being seen at convenient times (see above) and because most patients are unrealistic in their expectations of what can be discussed in 10 minutes and don't book a double appointment.

I hope you get your midwife appointment soon - but don't judge a whole service by this one cock up and don't take it out on the reception team - they do not deserve it.

Our surgery has lovely reception staff who are always very helpful, so they do exist. They also have some systems that are annoying, like the not being able to book more than a few days in advance, but as far as I can gather that's been foisted on them by targets and standards and all that jazz.

It is annoying when something like this happens though, and they should have let you know.

Am surprised you haven't had more appointments than just 16 weeks and now 30 weeks, though?

So northern why are A&E staff not rude - they are under the same amount of pressure if not more, but seem to be polite and helpful.

Northernlurker - the reception team at my surgery are RUDE - and I'm not the only person that thinks so! I'm sure that is not true at all surgeries, but it is so at mine!
Is it not their job to deal with the sick/ 'obnoxious' people that you mention in a professional manner?

Yes my GP has my phone number (it hasn't changed in four years and they've rang me on it before), and I would have thought if they hadn't got through to me by phone they should have sent something in the post. The appointment time was definitely not a mistake on my part (in case you might think that!) as it is written on the front of my maternity notes (and not in my writing!)

I definitely think I have a right to be annoyed with MY surgery for this!!! Do you really think I should just accept that they closed up for the afternoon when i had an appointment without letting me know?? You are right in saying that I shouldn't take it out on all surgeries though - perhaps mine is just exceptionally bad, that's what i want to find out!

Regarding the home visit thing I personally think GPs are paid well enough (on average £70k a year isn't it?) to visit people out of office hours. My DH earns half that amount and is often called at unsociable hours - part of his job.

Whatfresh - it's my fourth baby and apparently this is how much they need to see you with later preganancies. I think it does increase from now on though.

I agree that a lot of the problems are probably caused by the targets etc... it's good to know that there are at least SOME polite reception staff!!

A&E staff aren't generally dealing with face to face enquiries, routine paperwork and difficult phone calls at one and the same time for 8 hours a day. If you watch your GP reception staff you will see that is exactly what they are doing.

Mersmam - I believe an average GP has in the region of 2000 patients on their list - do you really think they can visit you all in the evening just because you feel like it?

Of course today's experience is annoying - but it doesn't justify the fury you seem to be spending on it imo.

A&E staff deal with people face to face, paper trails, difficult patients and have to work to time constraints all in one go on 8 hours shifts and longer! They are often in a confused state, relatives that are worried - just as much as gp reception staff if not more. Added to that unfortunately the ratio of patients dieing is higher in A&E and so that has to be delt with ontop of everything else.

Yet dont get ribbed constantly for being rude, often the opposite, you see cards of thanks and chocolates etc for the staff on reception at A&E.

My guess is that's because they often save people's lives or deal with people who are really scared and make them feel better, rather than people who are cross because their plans have to be rearranged.

not saying that mersmam doesn't have the right to feel cross, I would be too, but not sure the comparison stands up.

besides, I was in A&E recently with a broken bone in my foot, and the reception staff couldn't have been less interested or helpful, so it doesn't always follow!

My GP practice is probably average in the number of patients per GP from what you say, NorthernLurker, and they are much better at communicating than this, appointments are fairly punctual (we rarely have to wait longer than 20 minutes after the allocated time unless someone staggers in having a heart attack), and most of the receptionists are reasonably polite and helpful - not always perfect, but good enough. It is possible to get a home visit if the (younger) patient is too ill to attend surgery - for example when DS1 had suspected appendicitis, they came across because we really wanted an opinion about whether to drag him up to A and E or not, and this was very useful.

Our surgery certainly wouldn't pull a stunt like this and I think the OP is right to stomp because it sounds as though they have forgotten who their paymasters are.

Anyone who has not worked on reception in a doctor's/dentist's has NO idea how much crap the receptionists have to take from the general public CONSTANTLY...

Yesterday someone told me they hoped I felt good about myself and hung up, because the DENTIST wanted to charge them for missing an appointment and I apologised and informed them politely of this, and that is just the tip of the iceberg, believe me..

And I would not say I was "rude"...

NorthernLurker, I think I love you!

There are badly run practices and good ones like anything in life.

No one is perfect but being busy or under stress is not an excuse for being rude.

My GP's surgery receptionists are lovely - kind and helpful but it hasn't always been this way. We used to call one of the former receptionists 'Priscilla - Bitch of the Surgery'. Delusions of grandeur - I mix with doctors so I must be like them etc etc. Very snooty and inexplicably rude.

It was wrong of them to not tell you but it it happened to me I would mention the inconvenience but leave it at that. But then, I'm generally happy with my GP's practice and that is the difference.

Agree that there are good and bad surgeries. And there are definately some receptionists with a god complex.

However, the other side of the story is that when I was a Drs receptionist I had a chair thrown at me, I have been spat on and shouted at, called almost every insulting name you can think of and had to call the police when a man kicked in the glass door because he couldn't get heroin on prescription!

I agree that it sounds like your practice is not very well organised, it is worth complaining otherwise they never look at these things or try and improve.

I feel your pain, arranging your day around an appointment that doesn't happen is infuriating, especially through poor communication.

Northernlurker - My 'fury' (as you call it, I would refer to it as annoyance!) is justified I feel. Apart from my whole day (and my dh's) having being altered for the appointment, I get quite worked up before midwives appointments as to whether everything is OK with the baby (you may not be able to relate to or understand this but it is true!) and I found it stressful today to feel like that and then not to see the midwife anyway... I may not be being completely rational about it - but I am 30 weeks pregnant after all!

GP's reception staff must have a difficult time balancing all the things they have to do - but at the same time that is the job they are paid for, and not any more difficult than hundreds of other jobs out there. It does not entitle them to be rude to patients (and I'm sure many of them are not).

I would not expect a GP to visit 'just because I feel like it'. The one time I requested a home visit was shortly after I had given birth and had tonsilitis, and all three of my DCs were covered in spots! So it was hardly 'just because I felt like it' but also did not warrant calling an ambulance I felt.

I love the way that you had an appt with a MIDWIFE, but because the surgery was closed, it was the GP's fault.

where I work the midwives are not employed by the GP surgery but by the PCT, and just work in the surgery where the GP's are. so the midwife could have made you an appt not knowing the surgery would be shut.

Northernlurker, you are spot on. unusual to find someone sticking up for GPs on here. Cass.

I would like to add that I would never be rude to reception staff myself, and agree completely that they should be treated with respect. But I do have a right to complain when I have been treated badly as in this instance (Will probably just get trampled al over when I ring them tomorrow - but at least I've had my mumsnet vent )