Getting through to a doctor

It'll soon be 'we don't do bodies any more'.

Our doctors are amazing. You can always book an appointment online in the morning for that day and often with your preferred doctor. I spoke to mine a week ago and he offered to phone me this Friday to see how I am getting on. They will also see you face to face if necessary.

Our GP apparently doesn’t do ears either but for £20 across the road the pharmacist will!!
DH hasn’t been well since Friday-usually in good health. This morning he rang 111-they said our surgery will ring back which GP did mid afternoon and asked him to go in. He just made it to chemist to pick up prescription before they closed at 6.30. He would never have get an appointment today if he’s just phoned the surgery IMHO

My DH belongs to a very big GP surgery (11 GPs). It is impossible to get an appointment with a doctor, you have to ring at 8am. We tried last week 27 times before giving up. He then rang later in the day, and found out that he could actually get the service he needed from the practice nurse and so was given an appointment.
He attended at 9:30 this morning and he was the only patient in the building!
Something is very wrong....

A friend forwarded the following link regarding 17 cuts by the NHS, one is ear syringing!

www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jun/29/nhs-wields-the-axe-on-17-unnecessary-procedures

Hope the link works.

GrandmaKT, the reason for there being so few patients in the waiting room could well be that the majority of appointments were by telephone which seems to be the norm nowadays.

It seems that surgeries only deal with conditions they are paid additional payments for. A friend works at a GP surgery who was saying that surgeries are paid extra to see patients who are diabetic, overweight elderly etc and also for any vaccinations. If they choose to see a patient at home for example at a weekend they are paid £162 an hour. But it is their choice if not a locum may attend. She said her eyes had really been opened as regards all the extra money paid to surgeries for practically every service they provide. Before anyone shoots me I am only stating what she has told me.

GPs are self employed. Therefore when the NHS requires their services, they have to pay for those services. The Practice has to run the surgery building, lights, telephone, maintenance, employment of staff (nurses, paramedics, receptionists, cleaners etc) and then they pay themselves. Perhaps many are not aware that this is the situation, but you should remember that your GP is self employed.
Tony Blair’s government introduced the payment by results system. Each Practice will receive a payment from the NHS per patient on their books. They then get paid for delivering certain services such as asthma checks, diabetes checks. These additional checks are to encourage GPs to check patients with chronic conditions regularly rather than just treating the patient when he/she becomes so ill that they either turn up in the surgery, or hospital, or die.

However I should add that GPs do not only deliver services that they are paid additionally for. The ignorance around GPs and Practice management is astounding.

Sorry to be ‘ignorant’ maddyone and apologies for not having your expertise in medical matters but this was information from a friend who is an experienced practice manager in a GP surgery. So I guess she got it wrong then.

Did your friend explicitly say the only patients being seen are those on who have conditions that GPs are paid extra for? Is that what she said? Did you in all honesty believe that? Didn’t you know, or didn’t your friend know, that Practices are paid per result for some routine checks? Didn’t you/she know that these payments are to encourage Practices to monitor some conditions? Given the shortage of GPs and the pressure on primary services, some routine checks could easily be overlooked. In addition, the extra funds are used to employ Practice Nurses who normally do all these extra routine checks. Doctors are busy seeing and consulting with patients who are not already being treated and monitored for asthma, diabetes etc.

Your friend is correct in saying that Practices are paid per routine check. This money allows surgeries to claim payments which make it possible to do these routine checks.

I do have one question * Maddyone* which perhaps you could answer. I’m presuming that you are a GP or work in the medical profession. Ear syringing is no longer done in surgeries because the NHS have withdrawn the additional funding. As hearing loss through ear wax is debilitating ( I know because I suffer hearing loss) why have surgeries withdrawn this service? Is it because the funding has been withdrawn or other reasons. I would be interested to know as hearing loss can have a significant affect on people’s lives.

Must be lucky today ! Rang surgery and got answer to problem in less than 15 mins !

The way some doctor's surgeries have reacted to Covid is bloody ridiculous. It's about time they got back to normal and started behaving like a National Health Service again not a National Covid Service. More of us need non-Covid treatment but we are being treated like second class citizens, it's outrageous.

the whole NHS needs radical overhaul imo

I am registered at a largish practice,, can get to see a Practice Nurse, no problem,, doctors .... shaking head

yet, I have had to call 111 a couple of times during the lockups
and a doctor has called out to see me, no problem, and the hospital doctors also are available when admitted..

that is my personal experience.

I can’t answer that question Gwyneth I’m sorry. I’m not a GP, but my daughter and son-in-law are GPs, and that’s where I got most of my information from, but sadly no longer, because they emigrated to New Zealand on 13th May, to work as GPs there. They will be gone for two years, and I hope they will return then, but they may decide to stay. I hope they don’t, but that is selfish of me because I hate being parted from my daughter and our grandchildren. I’ll probably know more about the New Zealand GP Practices in another two years than I do about British ones

Anyway, about ears. My mother had a problem with her hearing. Her GP Practice no longer does ear syringing and so we found a Practice that does it privately. I think the cost was about £90. Anyway I took her down, but after the nurse saw her, she said she had no wax in her ears, so she wasn’t charged. We went instead to Boots because they have a sight/hearing clinic at some stores. It turned out her hearing was really down in both ears, and so she was fitted with hearing aids. The difference is amazing, she can now hear. Although my mother paid for her hearing aids, they are available on the NHS as I understand it, as my father in law has NHS aids. You could make an appointment at a Boots or Specsavers hearing clinic. Let me know how you get on.

Jaxjacky

I have seen my a GP face to face three times in the last year, most recently two weeks ago, after using the online PatientAccess app.

My surgery seem to have removed the ability to book via this app which means I too have to ring. Have given up trying now. I do wonder what the surgery is actually doing or how the elderly are getting through. They have a large banner on their website saying they are receiving a large number of calls regarding hay fever! How are these people getting through???

I suppose you all think that GPs don't read thingd like this so you can slag us all off willy nilly .
If you had any idea what it's been like being a doctor or health professional during the pandemic you would not be so rude and cruel .
We have been working our socks off and it is really demanding and emotional work .
The time we spend talking to and seeing you all is a minor part of the work load .
The stress is immense and many of our colleagues have actually died of Covid too . Even with PPE it's a very up close and personal job . Shop workers etc have been amazing but they don't actually have to get right up close to examine eyes , ears etc etc etc .
I am so fed up of reading all the moans . It makes me want to weep .
Please try to understand how totally impossible it all is to keep everyone totally happy .
A few positive comments might help !

Just to clarify my original post surgeries do provide a service to all patients not just elderly etc. The point I was making was that additional payments are made on top of the payment for each patient registered if that person is diabetic, overweight etc.

Thank you for the information re ear wax and your own experiences with your mother maddyone. It was very helpful.

I have no complaints and much admiration for our local NHS service.

I phoned my surgery last week, got through very quickly (surprised), asked for an appointment with a nurse (‘you will have to wait weeks for that’ I was told), ‘you must fill in a form that I will text to you’. So impersonal. Form duly arrived, completed and returned. Text back - ‘you will receive a phone call on …’, then another text ‘you will receive a phone call on … (different day). I phoned again to ask which day I would receive a phone call. Had phone call from Dr, he suggested I go to the surgery by 3pm (half an hour’s time). Saw Dr and being referred to hospital. What a waste of everybody’s time. This could all have been sorted by my first phone call. I’ve been with this practice for over 40 years.

Our doctors are the same, listening to the same music over and over and also being told you are in a queue for well over an hour. You then have to wait even longer for the GP to phone you back, that's if you get past the receptionist.
I finally got an appointment and I'm sure it's easier to get in a prison than the surgery. You are not allowed to the touch doors, but yet you touch an intercom button to tell them you have arrived.

I use 'askmygp' online. Always get call back from doctor within an hour. Brilliant system. If need to be seen usually same day.

I’ve forgotten what my drs look like. I’ve only had phone appointments nothing face to face but yet I can go speak to my specialist at the hospital face to face with no problems. I have to get my blood tested every 3 months and even the forms are handed to me through a window. But I can sit two inches from a nurse to take my blood and even she said loads of ppl are complaining about not seeing the gps. And don’t get me started on sitting on the phone to try speaking to dr. But even when you get through you have to explain to receptionist why. Which I don’t think as anything to do with her.