I've been dumped by my gp

[IrishDP]

not sure if anyone has any advice, but wanted to vent on here. I have recently moved with my family to a new address but literally 1/2 a mile from my old address. I dropped my doctors surgery and email to let them know about a week ago and tonight at 6:46 I got call from the say that we are now out of the catchment area and we need to find a new practice. It caught me off guard and did not what to say. I did ask if I could appeal and they said 'no'. Anyone had any experience with this? Is worth calling them in the morning to speak to manager? I do have an ongoing medical condition for which I take medication for and feel slightly anxious that I will run out of my supply before I can get registered with a new practice.

I think they are entitled to remove you from their books if you're no longer in the catchment and there are other people waiting to be registered there. I believe there has to be a GP accepting new patients close to you though, they can't leave you without one.

Don't see if as being dumped. It's just that your new address isn't close enough anymore. Call the new GP and find out how to register, and let them know when you'll run out of meds - they'll liase with the old surgery to make sure it's sorted in time.

Why not just go and register with breakfast practice?? I am aware you are anxious but there isn't an appeals process for GP surgery, you can't make them take you??

*another

And you haven't been dumped, you moved

As long as you are within the catchment area of another practice, they are not allowed to refuse you. GPs are not allowed to close their lists.

You won't get removed from your current practice list until you've registered with a new one. People move GP all the time, shouldn't be a problem.

I know it might sound like overreaction but I've been going to same doctors for 31 years. I just find it hard to believe that I've moved less than a mile down the road and we are now outside the catchment.

But the catchment has got to end somewhere...

Sorry, but it IS an over-reaction and you need to get on and register with a new practice.

You haven't been dumped, you're out of catchment. It'd be a huge mess if they started allowing people to be out of area as midwives, district nurses, health visitors and other professionals are attached to surgeries.

I work in a GP surgery and I was told it's to do with if you needed a home visit, which is more likely the further away you are as it would take more time and effort to get to surgery which might be prohibitive if you were very poorly, and also would take the GP longer to get there and back, thus meaning fewer visits could be done within the allotted time. It does sound daft when you think Number 10 is within the catchment but Number 12 isn't, but the catchment has to end somewhere.

And yes, as NerrSnerr said, it's not just the doctor you might need home visits from.

They have to give you 28 days to find a new practice, this happened to us last month. I can understand your concern but you'll be fine to get another supply of your medication from your current surgery, if you have any problems finding a new one. If you have a letter from the old practice, a new one is supposed to take you on provided you're within catchment. If you try 3 with no success you can contact NHS allocations who will register you somewhere.

I can totall understand why it's difficult being forced to move after such a long time. But you need to realise they wont be able to accept you as a patient.

Unfortunately those are the rules, where I live they are very very strict with regard to boundaries - there's no point complaining for going to the health authority, you will be under the catchment for another surgery and that's the one you need to register with, if they said no you would have grounds to complain about that but you can't complain about one out of area not accepting you anymore.

I know mine will accept patients living one side of my road but not the other after being asked which side of the road I lived on when I moved there!

Meant to say it should be a quick process. We phoned our old surgery on the Friday to say we had moved, they sent the letter out straight away saying we were it of their catchment so we got it on Monday. Phoned new surgery, they do their new admissions on a Tuesday afternoon so we went down there with our ID, kids red books etc. Half an hour later and we were all registered, had a new patient check (weight, blood pressure and a quick chat) with the nurse the week after. Easy.

Their catchment details / map might be on their website? Our one has it.

When we first moved to London and I was 6.5 months pregnant with DD1, so needing a GP and a maternity unit pretty sharpish, you would not believe the runaround I got. We lived in a postcode that was mostly within one London borough and therefore one PCT or whatever they are called, but our little pocket of this particular postcode was in an entirely different borough and therefore a different GP catchment. One would tell me to call the other, who would refer me to a third, who would tell me to call the first............ it was a bloody nightmare. If they couldn't even sort out their own catchment areas.............

Anyways, sorted now, DD1 is 12 and she certainly didn't let the pesky matter of the lack of her mum being signed up at a hospital stop her arrival.

My GP was totally overstretched a few years ago and they redrew their catchment cutting out 3000 of their existing patients. It has made a huge improvement to their service and everyone was passed on to another local surgery who had more doctors and space. There is no obligation for you to have the same doctor forever.

I can see why you'd be put out but you could have checked before you moved if you were that bothered. Your medical files will be passed to your new place and if you let both sides know you are concerned about your medication they will sort it out.

It's interesting, when I moved the same happened to me. I got registered fine with the new GP but my husband who didn't bother for ages discovered they had then stopped accepting new patients at the local surgery. No idea what they'd have done if he'd pushed the matter - as it was we moved again several months later and this practice took us both very quickly. The transfer process is actually very quick and they had my notes in the new practice in less than a week.

Sorry this has happened to you but the GP surgery here are very very strict about moving house

Hence why we did lots of research before we moved house last year to check we were moving to the centre of their catchment area as it was very important to us as a family to stay with same GP practice

We had a map with all the roads marked that we could buy a house in to stay with same surgery and we double checked with local health authority advice line that our address was still ok and also checked with the GP surgery before we made an offer on our house

Friends of ours would have to have left the surgery just by moving next door so the catchment areas are very strict

If it is important to other MNetters my advice is to research very carefully before looking at houses - sort of like you would with school catchment areas

We told EA we only wanted houses in certain roads,

Good luck with your new GP

Actually they are free to take you out of catchment if they wanted to, possibly with the stipulation that you aren't entitled to home visits. If you have a relationship with the GP, it may be worth a personal conversation before you give up.

www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/AboutNHSservices/doctors/Pages/patient-choice-GP-practices.aspx

HeartsTrumpDiamonds, this wasn't by chance in west London, was it??