audiology appointment BY PHONE

[mumwon]

Dh has received a hearing appointment to be assessed by phone call
This is almost as rich as his phone cardiology appointment
Anybody else had other appointments that make you shake your head!

The problem is that they just haven't got the space required to social distance patients. Therefore more apps are telephone ones.

The eye clinic where I am have now commandeered the large physio rehab gym next door as an extra waiting room as so many people need FTF apps with eye problems.
Its either do that, or offer less appointments 🤷🏼‍♂️

Please PLEASE feed this back to your trust / complain.

I'm not sure how this will help. DD's consultant can't see any F2F patients at the moment due to the number of Covid patients in hospital. I guess if he has phone consultations with all his patients he might at least be able to help some of them, and it gives him a view as to which patients should be top of the list when he can start seeing patients again.

What would I gain by complaining?

I have to get a phone appointment for my smear test 🤷‍♀️

Physio on the phone for slipped disc and sciatica. Totally ridiculous waste of time and tbh I don't understand how a decent physio could possibly think it a good idea!

I've had physio and dentist appointments by phone, but for my annual pill check they insisted I had to see the nurse, despite me offering to email over photos of my weight and blood pressure readings....

MIL had her dentist appointment over the phone.

Ds has bilateral hearing loss - we had the dentist via video link. He couldn’t seem to get why ds couldn’t instructions. Then audiology appointment that look liked the clinician was at home - we gave up as her reception was terrible and she offered a physical appointment. The thing is that a proper yearly assessment is not just a hearing test, the health of his ears and his equipment has to be checked too. Not possible over a phone.

Oh my god, smear test over the phone has got to be the most ridiculous so far

We have had lots of appointments via video call and phone calls. For some it works a lot better than face to face, for others the questions asked have led to a face to face being booked - ophthalmology when we said his sight was worsening as was the squint so we were seen a week later.

gosh yes we have both had dental appointments by phone
he had another annual review for another department which they did but he couldn't have the blood test (which means the hospital) so that was equally pointless
Please note this isn't a criticism of clinicians just this strange idiotic system
I do understand why though.

Same here OP, problems caused by impacted wax and narrow ear canals, don’t think its going to be much use.

Five year old DS had a paediatrician’s appointment over the phone, to check his head shape and size. That was in September - his paediatrician said he’d need a f2f appointment after all (no shit), and we’re waiting still.

DS has had two in person audiology appointments since lockdown, both a hearing test and a consultant. His ophthalmology appointments seem to have disappeared entirely though, which means, what with one thing and another, no one has seen him since Nov18.

Please PLEASE feed this back to your trust / complain. There is a HUGE push in the NHS to make a vast amount of clinical work virtual and to stay that way long term after covid. Management see it as efficient and refuse to listen to the reduction in effectiveness. Honestly as a therapist, I will give up my job if I have to work remotely for my outpatients long term - it just doesn't work!

This is my fear. Post Covid the need to make some effort at regaining financial control will mean a huge push for minimising ftf contact.

I have a gynae telephone appointment next week. To discuss the ultrasound scans I had done last August.

It's just a box ticking exercise so they can say I've been 'seen'.

I've kind of got one. Tinnitus with ENT consultant, by phone. When I have less than half normal hearing. First appointment, I sat by my phone, he didn't ring. Second appointment, got a letter to say he'd ring on the 25th - received the letter on the 29th. Still waiting for the third attempt.

My friend got sent a telephone appointment for her blood test 😂

My 93yo, pretty deaf dad had balance clinic appointments over the phone. Unsurprisingly they were useless and he gave up. He's had 5 admissions to hospital following falls since last March.

Oh, my mum had a memory test by phone so they couldn't sedthat when they asked her if she knew what month it was she checked the newspaper ,do you know the time of day looked at the clock etc. Eventually we persuaded them to do it by video with my brother setting it up. The results were very different and she now has a dementia diagnosis.

Audiologist here. In our trust all appointment are face to face with the exception of hearing aid servicing (drop in) and tinnitus reviews which is mostly counselling and imo an innovative way for a shielding colleague to continue to work.

We have considered conducting our initial questions over the phone prior to a f2f appointment thereby limiting the amount of time spent in close proximity to a patient.

The problem is that they just haven't got the space required to social distance patients. Therefore more apps are telephone ones.

I'm not sure social distancing is the problem. In my department we are just much stricter about asking people to turn up on the dot of their appointment time so we don't have many people in the waiting area at any one time. Relatives/carers are asked to wait in their car or the main entrance area (where you can still buy a coffee but can't sit down as they've removed the chairs ).

There are other issues to do with time spent cleaning, especially after an aerosol generating procedure.

For instance lung function tests used to take about ten minutes. Now they have to leave the room for a period of time for the air to settle before having a massive clean. So they are doing a fraction of the number per day than they used to do previously.

My department requires patients needing a lung biopsy to have a lung function test first and the difficulty arranging the LFT can mean a delay in arranging the biopsy.

I would also think there must be an increased demand for LFTs to assess people with long Covid. (I'm making an assumption there, I don't work in the respiratory department).

DP should have had a telephone consult with his oncologist yesterday (after being rearranged three times by the hospital). No one called. No one will respond to our messages asking WHY. I am sure of he hadn't bothered to answer we would've been hounded with messages telling us how much we'd cost the NHS, instead the NHS is happy to cost him his life.

Teen DD has Zoom cardiology appointment next week, i have been asked to weigh, measure height and do BP reading if we have monitor.
She normally gets an ECHO every six months, not too worried as she did have stress ECHO back end of Summer.

@Countdowntonothing

And one more! OT I had to send videos of him doing daily tasks like eating, walking up & down stairs and...dressing! So I was actually supposed to send videos...via WA of all platforms, of my child getting dressed/undressed, to a complete stranger.

We have been asked to do this for ds by OT my husband says there is no way he is sending videos of ds using the loo or getting dressed over WA.

DS is having speech therapy appointments via video which are pointless, he's also been having portage sessions via video. The only useful thing I can see coming from this is in reports I will have back up of how he behaves at home because he's been at home for all his sessions.

@Chocolatepeanuts It was light hearted & I do understand (except for the cardiology appointment that worries me because dh can't tell if things are declining - though I took his bp & pulse before)
You must admit some of these do sound a bit - strange though!
Dh tends to say useful things when they ask how he has been like "I am fine" no your blinking not - argh!