Today for the first time ever, I had to call NHS 111; and would just like to say how surprised, impressed and grateful I am with the excellent service.
It;s Saturday, woke up to painful recurrence of old problem. I ring GP. closed for weekend. Ring local pharmacy who have a good out of hours treatment service for UTI but it's restricted to under 65s; I'm too old. She says " You'll need a doctors prescription. Ring 111 and ask them for one."
111 keeps me hanging on the line for 15 minutes . Every five minutes a recording says " We know you've been waiting 5/10/15 minutes, but don't hang up." Then someone picks up and from then on, it's all plain sailing; kind and efficient call handler takes my ID details and symptoms asks questions then says " Hold the line for a few minutes; I'm going to do some record checking, don't go away. If we get cut off, I'll ring you back at home." A few minutes later she comes back and says " I'm going to take you into a consult with a nurse; I'll be there and you'll hear me passing on your symptoms. " On a 3-way call, I meet the nurse who asks further questions and says "Right, you do need treatment right away with antibiotics, but they have to be prescribed by a Dr . I'm going to arrange that. An out-of-hours Dr will call you at home . Call us back if there are any problems." They both wish me well., end of call.
An hour later I get a call from the local hospital. Its an out of hours Dr, who asks a few questions then says she will prescribe as requested and medication will be waiting at reception in 5 minutes.. By then I'm staying close to loo. DH drives 5 miles to hospital and its waiting with my name on.
Under 3 hours from first call to starting treatment. Pretty good!