Over worked doctors ?

[boxermum]

Hi,been a while since I've been here.
Something peaked my interest reading a newspaper article today.Aparently a new health check is being introduced country wide to millions of people over the age of forty.It will be online and will check things like blood pressure,height,weight etc.
This,we are told is to ease the pressure on GP's.
Now don't get me wrong,GP's can do a wonderful job,BUT will somebody explain to me what pressure most GP's are under, when you can't get an appointment to see them, they are present at surgery's fewer and fewer hours each week,appointments are held over the phone,passed onto practice nurses etc,etc.Not to mention the exorbitant money we pay them.
Thank God,as a mere mortal with umpteen health issues, cost of living problems, gas/ electric price hikes and many,many more problems that life throws out at us, that I don't have the pressure of a GP in Britain today.
What do you all think?

[Margaret Pilkington]

Recently I have had more need to have medical involvement in my life.
Not for me, but for my other half.
He had open heart surgery back in November.
On discharge from hospital he was given a letter that the GP also received.
It was to book a post op check up with a GP and had been recommended to be done two weeks after discharge.
The hoops I had to leap through to get an appointment were truly epic.
I was told that he did not need a GP appointment but a telephone consultation with the pharmacist.
This pharmacist was going to talk to us about meds that had NOT been prescribed by the GP at the practice, but by the cardiology surgeon.
When he phoned it was clear that this was the wrong person to be speaking to.
The pharmacist was the person who eventually managed to get an appointment.

My other half has had multiple health problems since his surgery and each time I have needed to rely on other health professionals to assist us getting an appointment.
I could tell you more but I won’t bore you.

I worked in the NHS for thirty years…I have to say that no longer inspires me with any confidence.
Least of all in emergency situations.
What is the answer?
Well train more Doctors. That would be a start…but obviously it is going to be several years before they emerge as qualified practitioners.
Did you know that the BMA put caps on the numbers of students who could undertake medical degrees?

[Margaret Pilkington]

It is good to have you back Boxermum…we need more contributors to come on here.

[Ryewolf90]

I went to Peel House Medical Centre the other week because when I woke my eye was really swollen. I was told there no appointments and somebody said to go to the minor injury dept at Accrington Victoria.

They told me they shouldn't have sent me there as they didn't have any doctors and that I should go to Blackburn or Burnley hospitals.

Anyway after being at Blackburn Hospital for an hour they made an announcement, the upshot was that there was a 21 hour wait to see a doctor. Apparently they had rolled out a new IT infrastructure that had crashed so were having to do everything using paper. They suggested going to Airedale (Skipton), Preston or Manchester hospitals or make an appointment for later.

Another time I called in to Peel House to make an appointment I was told I needed to be outside the practice at 7:40am for when they opened at 8am. I asked about making an appointment for the following week. They told me they didn't do pre-booked appointments any more. Which is a stupid system and it's not surprising that the urgent care dept at Blackburn has such long waiting times because people can't get to see a GP so just go to the hospital.

Peel House rang me yesterday but I was out, they never left a message, I tried ringing this morning but after waiting 30 minutes listening to canned music I gave up.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Ryewolf this is our practice and it is a shambles.
They do not provide a service for patients.
My other half has been close to the pearly gates three times since his heart surgery.
What did one of the doctors tell me about my concerns?
She said that I ‘should be more wife and less nurse’.

Later that day my husband was contacted to go straight to A&E as he was in danger of dying….his Hb was 49(it should be 160).
So I have no confidence in this practice.

[lettie]

I have to agree from my own experience that GP services are currently lacking. It is nigh on impossible to get an appointment, when you do it's by telephone, and despite me speaking to 4 different GPs on 4 occasions not one of them actually examined me. I was fobbed off and ended up paying for a private MRI scan which showed multiple issues with my hip. I was so glad I payed as I was seen by a specialist on the NHS within a week. My GP had the audacity to ask why I'd gone private!! I will not repeat my response on here.....

I find it ironic that I get regular invitations for routine health checks, presumable the ones that the surgery can claim government money for. I won't go to these health checks on principle that they can offer an appointment when there's money involved for them, but I can't get an appointment when I actually need it.

The primary care system is so broken, and don't get me started on NHS dental!!

[Margaret Pilkington]

Lettie, I am sorry to hear of the hoops you have had to go through to get a diagnosis and a referral.

I don’t know about you, but I find it galling to have given so much of my life to the NHS(and I know that you have too) and then find that my needs (or more accurately my husbands needs) are treated so badly.

My husband collapsed at home with a bilateral pulmonary embolism(large enough to have killed him) he spent 21 hours on a trolley in A&E. Triage meant nothing….or he would have been on a ward quickly and being anti-coagulated.
He was given none of his essential heart meds during this time….so was at risk of s stroke or a further heart attack.
Now if I had no medical background then I would not have recognised the dangers in this.
Maybe I would have worried less.
This all happened in November. He was told he would be seen by a cardiologist and a respiratory consultant.
Here we are in July…no appointments with either of these specialists.

I do not go to any of these invitations that make the GP’s business healthier…being a GP is about making money, not looking after patients

[boxermum]

Well said Margaret,all GP'S care about these days is making more money.
They are already paid extremely well for the effort they do/don't put in.
When I was younger,if you called the doctor out of hours ie 2am, your own GP came out to you,knowing you and your family medical history,thereby knowing how to treat you,these days locum doctors give medication without knowledge of what you are already taking leading to possible bad/dangerous consequences (personal experience)The hypocratic oath out the window,money money, money the song of today's GP'S.

[Lost in Cornwall]

You've triggered a memory of my ringing the doctor late one evening when my wife was in the later stages of pregnancy with our first child. Our GP turned up in a long evening dress, having clearly come straight from some function or other, and was more than happy to treat her. Can't see it happening now.

[Margaret Pilkington]

When you phoned a GP and your own Doctor turned up…a person who knew you as a person and knew your family.
Those were the days.
I remember Dr Chesney being called to one of my brothers who was very sick with meningitis…he came on his horse and tied it to a lamppost.
(This was in the 1950’s)

[ferret man]

Are you sure you didn't ring the vet Marg

[Margaret Pilkington]

No ferret man, Dr Willian Chesney was well known for turning up either with a horse and trap or just his horse.
We lived up on Riley’s Hill so there was plenty of grass for the horse to eat while Dr Chesney did his job..
The surgery was in Garbett Street and his wife was also a GP at that practice…she was Dr Grace Chesney.

[boxermum]

Ah Margaret,remember the doctors Chesney well.I lived almost opposite the Garbett St surgery on Higher Antley St.The practice was later taken on by Dr Fenton.I was a school girl friend of their daughter Anne.
That's when doctors WERE doctors and did all the work themselves. No bank of 'practice nurses' , or army of 'receptionists'.Dr Fenton once came to see my dad at 3am,he was in his pyjamas (Dr Fenton that is).
Doctors today are too pampered and mollicoddled.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Yes I remember Dr Fenton too.
They were very good doctors and devoted to their profession.

[Ryewolf90]

This problem with not being able to see your GP seems pretty common these days, someone I know tried to make an appointment to see his doctor (on Blackburn Road Accrington) and was told the same thing, ie no pre-book appointments, they get paid by how many patients are on their books, not by how many they see so they've no reason or incentive to see patients because they are still getting paid regardless.