GP's & Hospitals - What is going on

[Applesisapples]

My friends aunt was up from the South, needed to see a doctor, paid £75 quid to see one in a private clinic in Armagh ran by an ex Tyrones missus, the doctor she saw is the doctor I would see if I ever got an appointment!

That Doctor is in all likelihood taking those shifts because his or her practice can not give them any more shifts. Not the fault of the GP but the system.

I dont think so. Went part time (or just left) NHS to go into the private sector.

GP Practices have a limited number of sessions, even if they decided to go part time it would not impact on the number of appointments available at your practice. Most Doctors who leave HSC GP work do so because they can no longer put up with the insane work load.

Insane workload? 9-6 with a few hrs off for paperwork and calls in my local surgery. As you have said the GPs have limited availability which hasn't changed despite the massive uptick in need so how is their workload insane? The biggest complaint the seem to have is that they were being taxed too highly on their pension fund.

It isn't 9-6 though is it. Its 8-6, with a few hours of remote access to do coding, redact notes and to process hospital letters in the evening after the children are in bed. If the life of a GP is so easy, why can they not get anyone to do it? That is the real question.
Also don't understand why time to process letters from secondary care and to do calls is considered "time off" in your eyes.

You are not going to win with Tones, he is either deliberately winding or has some sort of axe to grind.

[Tones]

What a ridiculous statement - axe to grind!  The title is GP's & Hospitals - What is going on - the answer is you cannot get a GP appointment and everyone is ending up at A&E and hence its all fucked!

[RedHand88]

What a ridiculous statement - axe to grind!  The title is GP's & Hospitals - What is going on - the answer is you cannot get a GP appointment and everyone is ending up at A&E and hence its all fucked!

I don't know what you expect surgeries to do though. Do you want them to see people to 12 o clock at night everyday? There are only physically so many people who can be dealt with in one working day.

[Tones]

Firstly it would be valuable to put a phone queue system in place to say you have reached such and such surgery you are now 15 in the queue, it would help a lot of folk especially older folk and give you some semblance of getting somewhere instead of redialling 100 times only to be told there is no appointment.  I would save some appointments each morning for very vulnerable people who ring in after the 8.30 deadline so they can be seen the next morning, it would be great if a doctor rang back instead of a receptionist to say go to A&E instead they are so protected it's impossible to get speaking to them.

[Milltown Row2]

What a ridiculous statement - axe to grind!  The title is GP's & Hospitals - What is going on - the answer is you cannot get a GP appointment and everyone is ending up at A&E and hence its all fucked!

I don't know what you expect surgeries to do though. Do you want them to see people to 12 o clock at night everyday? There are only physically so many people who can be dealt with in one working day.

But you are paying their wages.. you should have them on tap

[Tones]

A man who openly abuses a broken system to skip the queue tries to be a smart arse, you couldn't make it up.

[Milltown Row2]

A man who openly abuses a broken system to skip the queue tries to be a smart arse, you couldn't make it up.

Says the man that makes up illnesses to get seen and wonders why the system is broken, also thinks the doctors sit about all day doing nowt.

Your a very angry lad. You'll end up with stress

[Rossfan]

Wait till he has to pay for water

[Tones]

A man who openly abuses a broken system to skip the queue tries to be a smart arse, you couldn't make it up.

Says the man that makes up illnesses to get seen and wonders why the system is broken, also thinks the doctors sit about all day doing nowt.

Your a very angry lad. You'll end up with stress

I changed symptoms didn't mention chest pain, unfortunately don't gym with my surgery's receptionist so couldn't skip the queue with a quick text and block some other poor unfortunate out.

[Tones]

Wait till he has to pay for water

We all pay for water in our rates.

[RedHand88]

Firstly it would be valuable to put a phone queue system in place to say you have reached such and such surgery you are now 15 in the queue, it would help a lot of folk especially older folk and give you some semblance of getting somewhere instead of redialling 100 times only to be told there is no appointment.  I would save some appointments each morning for very vulnerable people who ring in after the 8.30 deadline so they can be seen the next morning, it would be great if a doctor rang back instead of a receptionist to say go to A&E instead they are so protected it's impossible to get speaking to them.

Alot of surgeries have this already, but it depends on the number of phone lines coming in to the building. Digital lines are able to cover as many as you want pretty much and will be the norm in 5 years or so.

It also doesn't improve your chances of getting an appointment. There will still be the same amount of people dealt with in a day.

[Tones]

But it would give you a semblance of getting through, ringing 100 times and just getting and engaged tone is soul destroying, then you get a voice mail telling you you will be put through to the next available receptionist and then you get cut off.

[RedHand88]

Wait till he has to pay for water

We all pay for water in our rates.

No you don't. This is a popular misconception.

[Milltown Row2]

A man who openly abuses a broken system to skip the queue tries to be a smart arse, you couldn't make it up.

Says the man that makes up illnesses to get seen and wonders why the system is broken, also thinks the doctors sit about all day doing nowt.

Your a very angry lad. You'll end up with stress

I changed symptoms didn't mention chest pain, unfortunately don't gym with my surgery's receptionist so couldn't skip the queue with a quick text and block some other poor unfortunate out.

You're a liar, and not a very good one

"I had similar issue about a year later and made up symptoms to see a GP as if I had of mentioned chest pain they wouldn't have seen me, how ridiculous is that"

Then went on to say
"My issue included chest pain which was present for over 6 weeks, this I explained to the receptionist who rang me  back and said go to A&E"

So did you mention chest pain or not?

[lurganblue]

Firstly it would be valuable to put a phone queue system in place to say you have reached such and such surgery you are now 15 in the queue, it would help a lot of folk especially older folk and give you some semblance of getting somewhere instead of redialling 100 times only to be told there is no appointment.  I would save some appointments each morning for very vulnerable people who ring in after the 8.30 deadline so they can be seen the next morning, it would be great if a doctor rang back instead of a receptionist to say go to A&E instead they are so protected it's impossible to get speaking to them.

Alot of surgeries have this already, but it depends on the number of phone lines coming in to the building. Digital lines are able to cover as many as you want pretty much and will be the norm in 5 years or so.

It also doesn't improve your chances of getting an appointment. There will still be the same amount of people dealt with in a day.

Mine has this. But it can only hold 6/7 people in the queue. Therefore when the queue is filled, you get an engaged tone.  200+ calls to hopefully get onto the queue. Half hour wait from there. Nothing worse than being the next one up and it disconnects.