GP surgery

I feel I must say what an utter waste of time the 111 service is in most cases. Almost every time that I've contacted them I've had a long wait and then either been told to go to A&E or they have called an ambulance for me. If I'd gone to A&E at the outset I'd have been an hour or more further into my wait!
However I did use the service in Dorset and was actually connected to an on-call doctor who had a prescription for strong antibiotics sent electronically to the local pharmacy.
As with most things NHS I think that the service varies enormously from area to area.

Our large city practice is giving much better support to its patients now than it was a year ago.
Yes, a triage system is in place to decide how long a patient must wait for an appt. but I have been seen within the day when urgent.
It could be better and I have seen patients complaining/ranting at Receptionists but feel they don’t make the rules it is not usually them at ‘fault’.

I don’t want to die.
Yet it looks like I might, as due to not receiving the correct medical treatment I’m going downhill daily.
I’ve been waiting 2 years for an appointment with a cardiologist. In that time I’ve been admitted to hospital 3 times and I’m still waiting for a GP to prescribe the tablets the hospital told me I needed last time I was in hospital.
I go over the shops myself. I drive there and Tesco security guards collect a mobility scooter for me. There’s another, German shop I go to when I feel able to walk where they put my shopping into the car for me.
I have 5 tablets which keep me alive. The prescription is for 2 months at a time. Another tablet which I’ve been warned only work if not missed, have a prescription which lasts 2 weeks. The receptionist at the GP surgery says I must see my GP face to face as it sounds like I might not need to take so many of them as most prescriptions last a month. To see a GP I need to phone back the following day even though I’ve just spent 1 hour 43 minutes on hold waiting to get through.
The last Dr I saw at hospital even phoned me at home to make sure I got the prescription she had ordered for me and was disgusted that I was having to wait for it due to the GP surgery receptionist refusing to make an appointment for the following day and expecting me to phone back the following day.
I don’t want to die yet.
I don’t need to if I was receiving adequate medical care

Ours was dreadful pre-covid, even then had to queue down the road first thing in the morning to get an appt, as no chance of getting through on the phone. In fact, in one of those surveys published recently, it is in the bottom quarter of surgeries in the country for patient satisfaction.
A family member works at the pathology lab at one of the hospitals in the city, and says she has to spend a hugely disproportionate amount of every working day trying to get through to GP practices in connection with patients' tests and results - apart from the few fortunate GNers on here who have properly functioning GP practices, the whole system is just no longer working.

Thakyou BlueBelle,
I have worked as a receptionist in primary care for many years.
The insults, agression and even threats have become commonplace.
Staff turnover is enormous and morale rock bottom, many of us end our day in tears.
Please remember that reception staff can only work within the terms of their remit. The practice partners are the ones making the rules.

Mallin, that's dreadful. I really hope they sort themselves out and treat you properly.

My GP surgery is brilliant too. I recently filled in the GP's on-line questionnaire, had a text from the GP 20 minutes later saying she had sent a prescription to my local chemist for anti-biotics for my UTI, which I collected 15 minutes later. All done within the space of an hour. I would add I was going abroad on holiday two days later which I mentioned in the questionnaire.

I echo that GrowingOld.
Mallin 💐 please be persistent - don’t give up.

Our surgery wasn't great before the pandemic - even worse now! My husband developed an inguinal hernia, but they wouldn't give him an appointment, just sent him for blood tests and an ultrasound., which was so poorly done that it didn't show the Hernia. only a small lymph node. He had a phone call from a GP a week later, and despite him saying my husband would be referred to the general surgeons, he referred him for the lymph node! Fortunately the lady who saw him there wrote a scathing letter to the GP, and copied us in. I was then able to get him a face to face appointment (6 weeks later) The GP who examined him was horrified at the state of the hernia, and referred him to the general surgeons immediately, but the 1st appointment available is 19th June. It took 6 weeks of extreme pain and swelling for us to get a face to face appointment, for something which could be life threatening, if I wasn't so careful about managing it.

A couple of years ago, before I retired, when I was about to go back to work for the September term, I noticed blood in my poo! It was August bank holiday so surgery closed. I rang 111 and eventually spoke to a doctor who said I needed an appointment with my GP. I asked him what I should do if I couldn't get an appointment and he said "Go to A&E"

When the surgery reopened I did the 'queue on the phone' thing only to be told there were no appointments left! I was offered a telephone appointment with a doctor but told them I'd already had that on 111 so I would be following their advice and would go to A&E. I had an appointment at my surgery within the hour! Obviously it felt a bit like blackmail and I wouldn't do that if I wasn't genuinely worried, but surgeries don't want us to go to A&E because they wouldn't fit us in. I guess they get in trouble!

There used to be a walk-in centre near us, which was the place to go if there were no GP appointments, but that closed during the pandemic! Ringing 111 got us an appointment for my daughter when we really needed one to have some stitches out and our GP had none. It was at a walk-in centre 15 miles away! OK for us but not everyone can easily travel that distance!

It's a very sad situation in the NHS and I worry that it will get worse. Thankfully I get regular check ups with the diabetic nurse and my health is otherwise fairly good so I'm not too badly affected. I advise people to make use of 111 if their GP isn't meeting their needs. They usually find an alternative somewhere.

My GP surgery is wonderful, can always get an appointment, they are great at referring you for hospital checks too and chase up on your behalf if appointments slow

I haven’t seen my GP for six years. If something is wrong I fill in a form on the internet. Then a paramedic visits. If necessary he informs the GP who telephones me.
My home help cut her finger badly so went to the surgery just round the corner and was told that they no longer deal with those minor things and advised her to go to A and E. 28 miles away. She had to drive there and then wait four hours before being attended to. There are a lot of qualified staff in the surgery all standing around chatting.

Our surgery staff have become very good at posing for pictures on the practice Facebook site. But I can't even get in the phone queue. They just cut you off. So I am self-diagnosing and self-treating. Hope it's nothing fatal.

My GP has randomly decided a topical medication I have had prescribed for many years is not on my repeat list, (In spite of it having been prescribed every month for over 5 years)
I now have to speak with a doctor before I have it dispensed again.
Ring on Monday at 8am for an appointment.
Unfortunately I work Monday to Friday so I am on my way to work at 8am and will be driving.

Whereas my mother's doctor rings her up to see how she is. Yesterday, a practice nurse phoned her to say she was coming to the house the next day to do a blood test, and arrived on time too.

For those who ask I am in St Lucia. I did not go home in March 20 because of the outbreak of Covid. I have chronic heart problems and only one kidney so I must try to use common sense and take my meds regularly. Since then I only came back to pack and transfer my stuff here. I had a good cardio who I saw annually and paid as he had looked after husnand and me for many years. Now if I had a serious problem I would go to Martinique (10 mins flight) which is part of France so good services. We need to remember that GPs are private practitioners who are paid by the govt. to provide a service. I read today that BMA is a very influential group who persuaded the govt years ago not to give out too many places in universities to study medicine because they feared it would affect doctors salaries if there were too many doctors. I was in UK during the Brexit referendum. I just read Mallin’s post and I am so sorry that she cannot get the service she needs. Here I pay $28 ( about £7) to see my favourite doctor who can take up to half an hour with me to give me an ECG listen to my heart and lungs and does everything she can to keep me going. I love her ! In fact the slow pace of life and thd continuous sunshine have made me feel so much better.

I am genuinely puzzled as to why services at GP practices seem to have deteriorated so much in such a small amount of time.

I have given up trying to get through to my gp surgery. I needed to book an appointment so straight after work, made the call from my car (hands-free) and started making my way to the surgery. It was still ringing as I pulled up outside (40 minutes later) so I marched in only to find two receptionist’s happily chatting away to each other! Bearing in mind this was 17:00 in the evening, the quiet time. I asked if there was something wrong with the phones as I showed them my still ringing phone and was told they were busy!
If I need an appointment now, I go on their website and submit an econsult request. They usually get back to me within 48 hours with an appointment, albeit it’s always a telephone consultation but at least I get to talk to a doctor.

We are all puzzled why things have become so difficult post Covid Annie1. I spent 90 minutes waiting on the phone this week, only to be cut off as I got to be caller number 3. I gave up fir the time being.

Your life in St Lucia sounds wonderful. We visited the Caribbean fir the first ( and only) time a few years ago while on a cruise. We stopped at St Lucia which looked beautiful even in the rain , we got soaked, but I still have a picture of arriving in the sunshine etched in my mind.

Dixie if we try econsult we get a message it’s closed and to try again the next day, it’s always the next day.
It’s like the 8 am dash, but is closed down after about 15 minutes.

So grateful for excellent GP practices both here at home and for my Mum in Sussex.
I have had more contact with the Sussex GP over the last four months than any doctor ever before. The whole practice has been unfailingly kind and helpful. Doctor always phones and is a person rather than a prescribing machine - very happy.
I have also made sure that they know how greatly appreciated they are.
So sorry for people who struggle with difficult surgeries; just adds to the stress of feeling poorly.

I can’t understand why getting a face to face appointment with your GP is almost impossible.
They say it is shortage of GPs but my practice has the same doctors as before covid. The same doctors who you could get an appointment within a couple of days. Phone conversation diagnosis was unheard of and you didn’t have to be triaged by the receptionist.
It’s as though the GPs enjoyed the distancing from their patients during covid and decided they wouldn’t go back to the old ways.
When did doctors stop caring.

My practice is excellent, with the proviso that I find having to ring at 08:00:01 for an appointment and it still being 15 minutes to get through very triggering.
I've never had a problem telling the receptionist why I'm ringing, and in the most recent case - a throat infection - I was seen and medicated the same day. I had to drive 5 miles to a Walk-in centre with minimal parking but that's where the respiratory department is based, and I had an appointment time. I thought it a creative use of resources.

you could tell me that I am off topic, but anyone here been told to book booster covid vaccine, and tried to do just that?

I am in the process of trying to do that, and came here for some light relief!!! duh!

online places to get vaccine keeps changing, you have to be so quick off the mark when a local vaccine place comes on the computer,, I stopped to take a breath and it then disappeared, despite trying to get it back.. I think this Government, government(?) is trying to kill us all off with heart attacks.

forgot to say, it says "walk in "centres, then it leads you to book appt???????

In March I just couldn't get through to my doctors surgery. My son saw how upset I was getting, so he phoned 111. They said I would get a call back as soon as possible. The phone woke me up after midnight!