Urgh. GP surgery having a laugh!

dibuzz

Congratulations on the safe arrival of your baby boy :beer:

flossy_splodge

MamaMoo wrote: »

Well, I have a beautiful baby boy, so yes.
The NHS treatment left a lot to be desired though. Pretty much ruined the experience for myself and two other women. :eek:

Wow! Well done! You must be very happy at the outcome and blow the NHS. As long as you and the baby are fine, thats all that matters.
:T

SherbetLemon_2

Hi all,

I totally understand where you are all coming from, both professionally and personally.

I'm currently a junior doctor working in a busy GP surgery as part of my training. I'm lucky to be working in such a good practice. They open their local rate number phone lines for patients at 8am, appointments can be made in advance on the phone or IN PERSON! They even stay open at lunchtime for patients to come in and collect scripts etc. I've even make follow-up appointments for my patients instead of bothering the receptionists.

My own GP surgery where I am a patient is completely different. It doesn't open its 0844 phone lines until 8.30am, by which time I'm seeing my own patients so struggle to get urgent appointments for myself. I also get angry as I'm invariably using my mobile and therefore racking up a big bill. They close over lunchtime so both the phones are on that recorded message and the doors closed. They also like to make it quite difficult to get appointments in advance at times particularly as I need late ones. I'm so fed up I'm going into the other practice in my town to get registration docs for them instead.

I'm quite disgusted with some of your comments about not being able to make appointments in the surgery. I assume this doesn't apply to follow-ups or nurses appts the GP specifies? As you have mention, this is unfair to those who are unable to afford the phone calls.

The best place to start with any complaints is the practice manager. I would suggest putting something in writing. Complaining about the practice would not lead you to being struck off their list, in fact it hardly ever comes to that in most cases.

I wish you all luck with your quest for fairer GP access!

Katie

flossy_splodge

Have just had our airing and anyone who wants to add their comments, this is what the producer has just emailed to me.

Thats brilliant - I would have to urge people to get in touch with the show directly....they can email us [EMAIL="annieonair@bbc.co.uk"]annieonair@bbc.co.uk[/EMAIL] with their comments if unavailable to come on, or if they provide a number we can call them back.

Thanks! speak to you in 10 mins

Please add your voices, strength in numbers.

One invited guest was also an MP who is interested as well as a national campaigner on this issue who has asked the BBC to ask me to contact him so we can work together on this at the highest level so keep your stories coming good people and lets make this happen!:T

clemmatis

SherbetLemon wrote: »

Hi all,

I'm quite disgusted with some of your comments about not being able to make appointments in the surgery. I assume this doesn't apply to follow-ups or nurses appts the GP specifies? As you have mention, this is unfair to those who are unable to afford the phone calls.

The best place to start with any complaints is the practice manager. I would suggest putting something in writing. Complaining about the practice would not lead you to being struck off their list, in fact it hardly ever comes to that in most cases.

I wish you all luck with your quest for fairer GP access!

Katie

Katie, when my GPs had "no advance bookings, 'phone bookings only", it applied to follow-ups too. A trainee doctor there -- a registrar -- told me it meant follow-ups were very difficult, as patients would have do the 8.30 same-day thing again, with no guarantee of seeing her. Also, she said, there were a number of patients who genuinely could not 'phone at 8.30 without making special arrangements.... Official surgery PR was that everything was fine, but, she said, many patients were unhappy. -- she was great. But when her registrar gig was up, she went back to England.

Nurse appointments were supposed to be easier to get, but one nurse was annoyed that the receptionists had booked me in with her when I was in the surgery, and told me I had to 'phone at 8.30... . And I have to say, why should nurses make themselves accessible if doctors won't?

It took ages and ages to move from that dreadful system, by degrees -- a minor concession here and there -- to the more reasonable system they have now.

Meanwhile..., I got shingles. The pain hit around 4 am. I got back to sleep eventually but then slept through the "phone-surgery" slot. That was a Friday. The surgery of course had axed Saturday appointments... . By the time I managed to get an appointment and stagger to the surgery, the pain was ebbing and it was too late to give me any medicine that would help.

And my brother got shingles. But his GPs had held on to the old appointments system. When he rang, mid-morning, they gave him a same day appointment and appropriate medicines.

He's older than I am, and then, anyway, he was a lot less fit and well. But he got over the shingles reasonably quickly. I was weak for ages.


It is not good enough.

Of course, and we should never forget this, GPs introduced all this "phone-only, same-day" garbage as a response to the government asking them to provide appointments within 48 hours if requested, and paying them to do it. They could have done that without making it so difficult, and for some, expensive, to get an appointment, and making all appointments same-day.

Silent_Calls_Victim

It was a pleasure sharing air-time with flossy_splodge.

A recording of the item is now published on-line at this link.

I can assure you all that GPs continuing to use 084 numbers are in breach of their contracts. Many PCTs have allowed themselves to be seriously misguided on both the simple words in the contracts that they alone are responsible for enforcing, as well as on simple points of fact.

I will not repeat here the reams of information found on my blog at http://nhspatient.blogspot.com

Those interested to see the scale of the problem may be interested to view a map based on information published by NHS Choices.


I will be delighted to offer tailored briefings and other support to journalists and campaigners pressing the issue with MPs, PCTs etc.

This nasty mess will get sorted, but it is tricky.

JohalaReewi

barbiedoll wrote: »

They say that the call is charged at the same rate as a local landline call BUT,...

They might say that but it is simply not true.

From my previous post.

The cost of a Local call for residential callers (according to latest BT price list) is 4.032 ppm (inc VAT)

The cost of a call to 0844 477 8627 (the OPs GP) is 5.1ppm (inc VAT) so it is more expensive than a local call.

Silent_Calls_Victim

JohalaReewi wrote: »

The cost of a Local call for residential callers (according to latest BT price list) is 4.032 ppm (inc VAT)

http://www.bt.com/pricing/current/Call_Charges_boo/0016_d0e5.htm#0016-d0e5

Yes - that figure is on the price list, but it is meaningless in practice. It is NOT the cost of a local call for residential callers.

You will see that the figures given at the link quoted ONLY apply to certain ISDN packages, used for business from home, and the now obsolete "light user scheme" (replaced by BT Basic).

BT Residential customers are now ALL on Call Plans for which calls to geographic (and 03) numbers are free of charge for the first hour. Some Call Plans, other than the most widely used "unlimited anytime", are subject to time and day restrictions and BT Basic has a limit on the total duration of calls per quarter. Those who make calls outside the terms of their chosen package incur penalty charges.

The reference to "local rate" by the PCT is totally spurious. Since BT moved all of its customers onto Call Plans (starting in 2004) there has been no distinction between the rate charged for local / national calls. All other landline call providers followed this approach, which has obviously never applied to mobiles. The contract which the PCTs are required to enforce only refers to calls to a geographic number.

PinkLipgloss

Silent Calls Victim - I salute you!

Well done on taking positive action.

Silent_Calls_Victim

PinkLipgloss wrote: »

Silent Calls Victim ...

I note a location in another nation of the UK.

The relevant GP contract variations only apply in England and (separately) Wales. The practice of subsidising GP phone systems at the expense of NHS patients does not however respect national boundaries (see this map).

MSPs have been engaged in the issue (see this briefing), however progress was halted by the parliamentary election. I will be happy to provide support to any campaigners closer to what many claim is the true birthplace of the NHS.