Long wait for doctor's appointment

fionajbanana

On another note, when you get your first appointment for a hospital dept, they give you a time and date which is not suitable. Try to phone the number on the letter, and its never answered or get the engaged tone.

The hospitals moan about patients missing appointments, but give us a better system to reschedule appointments! Fortunately, the hospital dept I deal with allows me to book the next appointment when I finish with the consultant at reception.

Helix

fionajbanana wrote: »

So glad my GP has a drop in clinic every morning. I always get there at 8:25am and normally the 3rd patient. I just play games on my iPhone (on silent) to pass the time.

My previous GP practice you had to phone up at 8:30-9:00 each morning to get an appt. Was annoying to get the bloody engaged tone all the time and on the odd occasion, no more slots! OK for your days off as I wasn't fussed what time I saw the doc, but on days where I stated work at 12-1pm, always the afternoon appts available. I am really going to take a 2:20pm appt when my GP practice was 15 mins drive from work in the middle of the day.

Do GP practices understand that about half of their patients work?

That is how mine works too, although you are also competing with the people queuing up at the surgery in person as well. With ours is often better to go down in person at 8.30 as by time the phone stops being engaged all the appointments have gone.

They have at least in the last couple of years let you start booking some appointments in advance if you don't mind waiting. It used to be on the day or nothing even if it wasn't an emergency.

zaksmum

When my GPs had the open surgeries on Wednesdays and Fridays they were inundated with patients wanting to be seen. They guaranteed that if you turned up between 8am and 11am you would definitely be seen by a GP. There were massive queues outside from about 7am.

So having scrapped the open surgeries you would expect some sort of better system to be put in place regarding the appointments. The receptionists are just not interested - no appointments for over three weeks and that's the end of it.

derrick

doughnutmachine wrote: »

if they brought a charge in for visiting the doctor everyone would get appointments a lot easier...

They already have one, National Insurance Contributions and coupled with income tax, VAT etc do you not think we already pay more than enough? Why should we have to pay again?

I do agree with you about the trivial complaints, and maybe a fine system could be operated, but who would define what is trivial?

.

Arthurian

Receptionist told me if I wanted to see Dr X, I should have phoned 5 weeks ago for the appointment. To see any doctor, ie not a specific name, I had to wait 2 weeks for the next available appointment. I could have lied and said it was urgent to get an appointment the next day, but conscience wouldn't let me.

doughnutmachine

derrick wrote: »

They already have one, National Insurance Contributions and coupled with income tax, VAT etc do you not think we already pay more than enough? Why should we have to pay again?

I do agree with you about the trivial complaints, and maybe a fine system could be operated, but who would define what is trivial?

.

but if something is free at point of use they are more likely to abuse it. if there was a fee (like a tenner) people would be less likely to go to the doctor because they had a cold.

if i was a doctor's receptionist i would rather give appointments to people that haven't been in years rather than people who are in every month. after all the person that hasn't been in for ten years is more likely to have a legitimate problem.

zaksmum

doughnutmachine wrote: »

but if something is free at point of use they are more likely to abuse it. if there was a fee (like a tenner) people would be less likely to go to the doctor because they had a cold.

if i was a doctor's receptionist i would rather give appointments to people that haven't been in years rather than people who are in every month. after all the person that hasn't been in for ten years is more likely to have a legitimate problem.

What if someone who comes in every month has a condition that needs regular monitoring?

doughnutmachine

zaksmum wrote: »

What if someone who comes in every month has a condition that needs regular monitoring?

i would still suggest that going to the doctor once a month would only cost £120 a year at a tenner a visit.

a tenner is enough to to discourage the people that consider a visit to the gp as a day out. but it's not enough to discourage people that have a genuine ailment.

flicks

oldagetraveller and barbiedoll, many thanks for your replies and link. I agree entirely that this is unacceptable but it really seems we are banging our heads against a very well built brick wall. I am guessing the doctor or nurse at the surgery must be testing the water sample and noticing an infection before they are prescribing antibiotics but it would be nice if they would send it for analysis or arrange a hospital appointment to try and discover why these infections are so resilient and re-occurring. Very, very frustrating.

barbiedoll

flicks: Yes, you're probably right, but if they are just testing her urine with dipsticks (as I do all day long!) all that will show up is the white blood cells which may indicate the presence of an infection. A proper laboratory analysis would show exactly which bacteria is causing the infection and which antibiotic is needed. I send lots of these samples away every week and any that come back positive are given a report listing what bacteria is present and what antibiotics are effective in treating it. For your GP to keep prescribing antibiotics without knowing what type of infection they are treating, is madness, especially with all the furore about antibiotic resistance now.

If you can't get to see the GP, ask for a telephone referral and when he/she calls you, tell them that you want your daughter's urine to be sent off for analysis. The GP will be able to leave a form for you at reception, all you will need to do is bring in the sample.

Don't take no for an answer, I know what it's like trying to get a GP to listen to you. But your daughter has the right to treatment for her condition, so don't be afraid to make a noise.

Good luck!