Is it this hard to get blood tests everywhere now?

[LlamaNoDrama]

My GP surgery now send people on a 34 mile (50 min) round trip to get bloods done. This is in a car if you drive.

I've no idea how people who don't drive manage (it would be at least two buses or a train and one or two buses depending on your mobility).

Then you have to wait 3-4 weeks for an appt.

I think it's ridiculous?

You can get them privately.
I got a same day appointment with results emailed within a couple days.

My doctors surgery is all online based, you can book blood tests via their app, although you need to get a GP appointment first in order to find out if you can have blood tests. Said appointment requires you to ring up and book a telephone appointment, that might take 3 weeks just to get a 10 minute slot, then the doctor will decide if they want to see you in person, if so they'll give you an appointment at the surgery, that's likely to be another 3 weeks, then if the doctor wants bloods, you can finally book an appointment on the app.

It's so ridiculous and unfortunately becoming more common across NHS trusts

DD had one last week. It was requested by hospital so was done there. She got an appointment next day and was in and out in five minutes.

previous ones at GP were pretty much the same though.

We go to health centre or hospital ( both in out small town)…..so less than a mile ….it’s a drop in ….so just turn up with your blood forms on mon, tues or Friday between 8.30 and 12th …l, and are seen ……you take a card with a number and then wait your turn…..results usually available in 2 to 3 days via your gp practice…..it’s never been any different in the 24 years I’ve lived here

Same in my town, the GP surgery has stopped doing them and the local Facebook group is up in arms about it. A round trip of two buses each way for a 5 minute procedure that many people are qualified to do! Insane. And we have a cottage hospital too so you would think something could be organised there.

I need regular blood tests. I use the NHS app to book at my surgery which is 7 miles away and there is no public transport. I could choose to go to the path lab at the hospital which is a 30 minute drive.

Mine have done something similar. They’ve merged with two other surgeries and blood tests are now done at the town centre surgery. There is no parking so it’s an hour round trip on the bus. I used to be able to walk over the road and it would take 15 minutes. Now I need two hours off work. It wasn’t even done to benefit patients, three failing practices have now merged into one utterly useless practice.

My GPs does them there. They’re part of a network of 4 surgeries, and I have the option of booking in at any of the 4 in our town which maximises appointment availability. All the surgeries are within a mile and a half of our house so it’s really simple! Our GP does seem to be really good though based on other experiences.

I believe this is a recent change from gp’s protest over funding. They are limiting the number of patients seen per day and refusing to carry out various tests. It is for individual practices to opt in or out so will vary.

I have to book online (since covid) and usually the earliest appointment available is two and a half weeks later. It can only be done at the hospital whereas before covid several doctors surgeries grouped together to hold blood taking sessions so there was always somewhere reasonably local.

Surely your GP must realise the distance is unreasonable, especially if their patient is poor/benefits.

Not around here. I had a bowel issue recently. Phoned surgery and got a GP F2F for a week’s time. Saw GP and he asked me to book in for bloods. Got an appt for a week later at the surgery to have bloods taken. And the surgery is ten mins walk from me.

It depends where you live, surely, and which services your GP surgery provides? Ours doesn't do blood tests, because they're done in the local hospital, but that's really close so it's not an issue. My parents, who live rurally, have an excellent surgery that provides many screening services in-house, so it's easy to get a blood test. But GP surgeries are incentivised and paid extra for those services and not all surgeries can/do provide them, so it's a bit of a lottery.

That's exactly how my GP practice works. I have tests every 3 months due to one of my prescribed meds. When I am there they make my next appointment.

Surely your GP must realise the distance is unreasonable, especially if their patient is poor/benefits.

I don’t think it works like that- the GP surgery just thinks about what suits them, they don’t have a sense of wider responsibility for services being available.
You would think a centrally funded service like the NHS ought to be able to say ‘every area has to have this service accessible, if the hospitals are a long distance away the GP must provide it’ but apparently not.

GP practices are not paid to employ nurses - they have to pay for them out of their budget. Therefore they do not have offer a nurse service. The budget that the GP practices got this year was at least 4% less than they needed and with council tax, rates, utilities, etc going up they are feeling the pinch like everyone else. GP practices are only paid for a set number of blood tests per year (if they do them) and any more than that are funded at the Practices expense (cost of using the lab, nurses time, etc). That is also generally why if a consultant wants you to have a blood test and you book in to have it done at your surgery, the surgery will want you to bring the blood request form along with them as otherwise the Practice ends up footing the bill for the bloods your consultant wanted.

That is why they are currently taking industrial action. Each Practice can follow them through as they like. The Practice I work for is limiting the number of patients seen/spoken to each day to 25 per GP. The main industrial action we are taking is more to do with hospital interaction and although it will affect patients it won't have a huge affect on them. Some practices are limiting GP's to 25 interactions per day - so if they sign say 10 prescriptions, deal with 10 hospital letters that only leaves them capacity to speak to/see 5 patients.

Its pretty much like saying you go to a fish and chip shop to get your lunch and the owner isn't allowed to charge you for chips but has to provide them and give them to their customers for free. They would still have to cover the costs incurred for providing the free chips!!!

Usually a 3 week wait at the local hospital to get a blood test. There are ones with quicker dates but its harder to get to on public transport. Our doctor's won't do blood tests anymore. Only for housebound patients.

Sure, but the patients didn’t design the system and they are the ones who are suffering.

They do that at my surgery I got same day result last week on the NHS app

I do get that but it’s ridiculous that the surgery hasn't considered it is 34 miles by car, which is something not everyone has access to. I wonder what the other local surgeries do. Or maybe it has considered it but doesn't care enough which doesn't bode well for the rest of their GP service.

Might be something you can flag to your local MP @LlamaNoDrama .

I agree, they are. But sadly the last government gave them such a low budget to try and work with that we may start to see some practices closing simply because they go bankrupt. The first way to for them to stop this happening is cutting back on the services they offer to try to save money.

Just had to wait 3 weeks for a blood test at my surgery. At least they are still doing them though I guess :/

SUPER fucking helpful

the solution, when we pay tax to facilitate an NHS, is NOT to go private for simple, everyday solutions. FFS.

Just searching to see what is normal after having to wait 2 weeks at my local GP surgery. I thought having to wait 2 weeks just for a blood test was mad, clearly not!

I am lucky enough to no longer be reliant on NHS as we moved to Europe. Completely privatised healthcare , same day GP appointments, bloodtests at GP surgery, minor surgery at GP, it goes on. Yes, we pay a lot for healthcare, but boy, I feel sorry for my inlaws when they tell me they have to wait weeks for an appointment, only to see a triage nurse before GP will see them.