Getting an appointment with your doctor rant!

sammo62 said:
My one is first come first served for a set number of appointments per day with the phones opening at 8.30. I've never failed to get an appointment that day if I call when they open.
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This tbh.

Plus a better chance of getting a slot if you personally turn up at 8:30 to ask for an appointment. Sometimes the lines are too busy or they're talking to the guy who turned up in person at the desk, giving him the slot you wanted and ignoring the phone.
 
This sort of behaviour from GPs was brought about by the frankly appalling number of no-shows and late cancellations when people could book days in advance.

Some practices have swung entirely the other way so make your feelings known to the practice in question or simply move practice if you can.
 
psd99 said:
Not really like that in mine

* they open at 8 but you never get through at that time because the lines are so busy
* if you do get through they say ring back in the afternoon at 2
* when u ring at 2 u never get through again
* when you do get through they say ring back tomorrow
* also there is one of them who is so moody and never wants to give me an appointment
* one of them is nice - she goes out of her way but don't get through to her often.

This happens everyday in my surgery whenever I have rang them up. Maybe it is time to change
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Personally, I have never had a problem getting an appointment but then I am pretty healthy overall :)

How often do you have to make appointments? Every day?

As you say, "Maybe it is time to change".
 
There is a different between a regular or routine appointment which can be scheduled any time within a couple of weeks and an emergency or urgent appointment which you may need the same day.

The urgent appointments are usually set up by phoning first thing on the same day. We have never had problems but like anything you just need to understand the system. Worse case is you may need to be flexible with seeing a different (rather than your regular) GP at the surgery.

If you just need some advice or think you need a second dose of antibiotics etc. then you can usually ask for your GP to call you back rather than booking an appointment, if they think you need an appointment they will fit you in at end of surgery or refer you to out-of-hours.

The alternative to your GP is using your local community or hospital out-of-hours clinic and you can get the contact for this from your local PCT website or NHS direct / equivalent. These clinics are the best thing ever if you genuinely need it (especially if you have young children who can deteriorate quite quickly), as you can bypass your GP and see someone in the out of hours clinic in the evening or weekends. Near us, these clinics are manned 24x7x365 by a hospital doctor. Unless bits are hanging off you, this is usually much quicker to get through to see someone than A&E.
 
Just to clarify there is little point in going to A&E with an ongoing non emergency medical problem. You will wait for hours to be seen, and it's not really what it's there for.
 
Some of them say "ring back before 8" blah blah blah. But my current one I can just phone and book an appointment at any time really.
 
My Ma's is woeful, she has to ring up in the mornings to see if theres any available slots. They dont do advance bookings unless the doctor themselves requests it.

My personal one is rather good. Just ring em up, and ask for whoever you want and they'll slot you in when next available. the doctor I like to goto often is usually quite busy though, as she has a good relationship with patients, but if its urgent and you don't care who you speak to, you can usually get one the same day.
 
With mine you have to phone up at 8:30 in the morning for a slot. As soon as the line opens it is engaged. When you finally get through all the slots are usually taken. So it's a gamble on whether you can get an appointment or not. That's a real problem for me because I have to be at work by 7:30 so if I need to see someone then I have to take a chance on getting through and go in late. Often I don't get through in time and end up just going into work late and without managing to get an appointment.

However they do have an emergency session so if it is really urgent you can get on that list and then turn up and wait later in the day.
 
psd99 said:
Getting an appointment is a joke - do any of you go through the pain like I do?

they always say "ring back in the afternoon"

I'm fed up of this consistent problem! anyone feel the same?
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I always go there in person to book an appointment; they can't fob me off if I do that. :D
 
Ours is pretty good, although it's a large paractice.

From what I can tell they break the appointments up for each doctor so that X days in advance they'll open up some slots for advance appointments (non urgent, things like medicals and discussing vaccinations for travel), Y days in advance they'll open up more slots of for non urgent appointments that might require seeing to in a timely manner, then on the on the day they'll open up the last block of appointments for urgent things.

Normally I can get to see the doctor within a few days at most, it seems to work.
 
see going there in person is like not feasible

anyway they got an appointment in 14 days
it is a total joke and getting disgraceful. This practice used to be good FML!

I'm going to keep ringing them up.
 
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