Depression Forums
Depression Related Forums => Depression Central => Topic started by: Beetzart on July 16, 2012, 06:13:14 PM
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I wonder if this could be a thread to share tales of frustrations with surgeries, and mainly getting past the dreaded receptionists.
My surgery has recently gone back to the 'ring for an appointment and hope for the best' system. When you try to make contact (it can take dozens of tries before you get past the engaged tone) on any particular morning they will tell you nothing is available for two weeks, and if you want to see a specific GP then you will have to wait until it snows in the Atacama desert! There is a way around this though, and that is asking for an emergency appointment. Now again you need to ring at 8am, but it can take ages to get through by which time the morning ones have gone and you get told to ring after 1pm. Easier to get through at this time but the receptionist becomes extremely protective of the 5 or so slots open that afternoon. She has to make sure you are worthy of getting emergency treatment normally by asking 'is it really an emergency, can't it wait till the morning?'. So you have to persist and say you need to see a GP. Her next line of defence in her armoury is 'oh, ok but can I ask what the problem is?'. Now this is what gets me. Are receptionists now fully qualified Triage Nurses? What problem in their eyes wouldn't be worthy or an appointment? Who would be held accountable if the patient couldn't communicate their need for seeing a GP coherently enough, got refused then fell seriously ill during the night (or committed suicide) or worse with something that could have been helped with medical care? Do the GPs actually endorse their staff to ask these questions?
Saying that they have never refused me and I am always honest with why I need to see a GP. That turned into a bit of a rant, although overall apart from that it is a decent surgery and I have had no serious problems.
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Our surgery has improved in the last few years but the out of hours 'service' is truly appalling. On more than one occasion I phoned 999 for my dad when he was terminally ill as they wouldnt come out when he was in extreme pain (he was partially paralysed) and one occasion I've done it myself when I was immobile with pain the morning following a sigmascopy and was facing a "4-6 hour" wait.
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This sounds a good idea. I have no problem with my surgery here. But when I lived in Norfolk we did. My son had just come out of GOS in London and we had to ring our surgery in an emergency. Was asked by the receptionist was it urgent and what was the problem, now they had got a letter from the hospital which I took in personally. I told her I can tell you but you will not understand. He has a Metrophanof stoma and I know she wouldn't know what that was. Anyway I felt it was nothing to do with her. They could see from our records that I was not a serial attention seeker lol. A locum Dr did come out and was rude, asked if I had a phone then rung the local hospital (which was miles away) told me I would have to get hom there myself! I didn't have the car as my then husband. Was living abroad with it. Luckily I had relatives near by so they drove us there. Needless to say I changed Dr surgery after this. I needed to know I had good back up with a child with serious medical problems. Sorry rant over :). S x x x x
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At my surgery the receptionists are like undercover agents, giving out no information about the doctors and even less about the appointments. I am grilled regularly by them as to the nature of my enquiry and I find it very insulting.
My GP has agreed with me that due to the nature of this depression and my suicidal intentions that he will ALWAYS take my call. However, the receptionists feel that they know better !!
Very frustrating. x
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I have to say my GP surgery is really good.
We ring on the day at 8am and can book any appointment for that day( am & pm) with the GP of your choice. 8:30 - 10 am are pre bookable appointments and the theres the sit and wait and the late evening clinics.
The system works well I've never had a problem seeing the GP I want to on the day I want to. The receptionists don't ask questions either ^-^
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I am lucky with our surgery here thankgoodness. We have the same ring at 8.15 am and can see our Dr that day also the receptionists are lovely too. I only ever had this problem at that one surgery. S x x x x
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Our surgery is very good too, it didn't used to be but it has improved a lot.
We can get some pre booked appointments but there are only a limited number for each day. You usually have to ring up on the day at 8am but I have always got an appointment and have always got the doctor I ask for (unless she isn't in). I don't know about the emergency appointments but once my mum phoned our doctor because my asthma has suddenly got very bad over a few hours and she arranged for a nurse to check me over within the next hour and she would also examine me if the nurse was concerned.
The receptionists are all ok too, they don't seem to ever ask questions and when I phoned up about my bloodtests last time the one I got was very helpful. She explained everything to me and read out the letter the doctor sent, so I think some of them do know some stuff.