Help with note from Doctor

krisskross

hjb123 wrote:

Do you not reckon if he was offered money he might write more?!

Don't think this is quite how it works!! :rotfl: :rotfl:

D&DD

Hi HJ had a long chat with my doctor last night about this as you know am doing the same thing with my son.He normally charges £10 a letter (he did when asked to write in support of transport to secondary school this year and just sent a pile of photocopied hospital bumpf )When I told him why I needed it he asked us to come into the surgery with our boy then he can write the letter about his difficulties while we are there which seems fair enough.DWP have also sent a form so he can write on this too as he's not happy himself about the level of support we are getting so at least he's supportive.Would this be a better way to approach it? Take all your forms for the appeal with you,tell the receptionist why you are coming and sit there while he fills it in I know all docs work differently,my other sons phsycologist wouldn't write a letter but was eager to help with the forms,sometimes they have surgery rules they have to follow maybe??

hjb123

I took my forms in last time and he said he would write a letter but other than that there wasnt alot he could do. The letter he wrote was practically useless! It said that I had been referred and was awaiting results and 'whether or not I should be put through another assessment'.

I have - or had - dont know which at the moment - a high opinion of my doctor - I felt that he had been brilliant but once you get someone who is specialist on your condition or independant it makes you see things differently! He has been brilliant though. He is down to earth though, even uses colourful lanugage - just like myself! - not in a bad way - just everyday sort of colourful!!

I dont want to do anything to get him wound up but if it helps me get sorted.....


H

Savvy_Sue

I don't know in what circumstances GPs are paid, but I do know that when I was waiting for my consultant to tell the DVLA whether or not I was safe to drive, the DVLA told me that they do pay the consultant for the report. Which made me even more cross that the consultant had ignored the first two requests for a report!

cattie

Savvy_Sue wrote:

I don't know in what circumstances GPs are paid, but I do know that when I was waiting for my consultant to tell the DVLA whether or not I was safe to drive, the DVLA told me that they do pay the consultant for the report. Which made me even more cross that the consultant had ignored the first two requests for a report!

If a government department requests a medical report from the gp then they do pay the gp for the report.

My useless gp had requests made for a report by the DWP last year,which she ignored. They then contacted my consultant who had a report send off inside a week. :T

My gp did contact me nearly 3 months later to ask me to go in & see her as she had a report to fill out for the DWP about my disabilities! I told her to forget it, she was way too late & that my consultant had provided a medical report.

andrew71

I was in the same situation as you hjb123 regarding Doctor's letters and CFS.
I had to pay £15 for the doctor to write the letter (very expensive pen and paper they must use). This was so I could see the copy. Whether the clinic was right or wrong I have no idea.
Regarding CFS there isn't much the doctor can say in the note beside the fact he/she has seen you and is refering you to a cfs/me specialist.

Bendybops19

PP, you have got a great GP there, wish they were all like that!

Thriftylad

I work as a Welfare Rights Adviser and unfortunately come accross uncooperative GP's and those that wont lift a pen without charging their own patients a hefty fee. Personally I feel it is disgraceful for GP's to treat their own patients in this way, particularly those who need their support to claim benefits - these are the poorest people in our society. There is also a direct corrollation between poverty and health and a refusal to help only increases their workload in the future and does a dis-service to their own patients. All of us as taxpayers have already paid for their services/education/training anyway so it is further frustrating when they demand cash.

Anyway (rant over now!), a potentially better source of medical info for social security appeals can come from your own medical records. These contain all of the info the GP would refer to when doing a letter and will have hospital letters, test results, referral info etc in. everyone has a legal right to access thier own records under the Data Protection Act and the max that a surgery can charge for photocopying is £10, if all of the records are on computer (max £50 if manual records). Once you have all this info, you can then pick out the bits that support your claim and forward to the tribunal. Similarly if attend a hospital, you can write in and request copies of the records they hold about you. In my experience hospitals do not charge a fee for this but can take a few weeks to reply. I hope all this helps.

ohreally

For the GP to provide the DWP with a medical report which favors your claim in a manner that the first didn't would, imho, open a can of worms and raises more questions than it addresses, not least the credability of both reports but it also is discriminatory against those who are worst off, i.e. the very people who are claiming benefits to start with.

hjb123

Thriftylad wrote:

I work as a Welfare Rights Adviser and unfortunately come accross uncooperative GP's and those that wont lift a pen without charging their own patients a hefty fee. Personally I feel it is disgraceful for GP's to treat their own patients in this way, particularly those who need their support to claim benefits - these are the poorest people in our society. There is also a direct corrollation between poverty and health and a refusal to help only increases their workload in the future and does a dis-service to their own patients. All of us as taxpayers have already paid for their services/education/training anyway so it is further frustrating when they demand cash.

Anyway (rant over now!), a potentially better source of medical info for social security appeals can come from your own medical records. These contain all of the info the GP would refer to when doing a letter and will have hospital letters, test results, referral info etc in. everyone has a legal right to access thier own records under the Data Protection Act and the max that a surgery can charge for photocopying is £10, if all of the records are on computer (max £50 if manual records). Once you have all this info, you can then pick out the bits that support your claim and forward to the tribunal. Similarly if attend a hospital, you can write in and request copies of the records they hold about you. In my experience hospitals do not charge a fee for this but can take a few weeks to reply. I hope all this helps.

So I can speak to my GP surgery and request copies of some of my most recent medical records just like that?