When I am given appointment I then turn up punctually at the given time only to wait at the very least for an hour to be seen, and often two hours or more
Truthseeker - lucky you, having evening appointments! My GP surgery operates Mon-Fri, 9.30 - 5pm (with a break for lunch), after that it's the Doc on Call service. Thankfully I haven't needed it
It is almost impossible to keep to appointment times in a gp's surgery. Appointments are allocated but then patients walk in without appointments and insist they need to see doctor and its urgent, people make one appointment and then arrive with 3 other family members who also have to be seen, patients newly discharged from hospital have to be fitted in the same day, a patient has a ten minute appointment and arrives with a written out list of problems which take half an hour to sort out, a patient who is upset/distressed can't be pushed out the door when their ten minutes is up, phone calls from patients interrupting doctor, emergency house calls that take an hour - I could go on. We do our best but delays are very difficult to avoid unless we gave appointments every half hour and then it would take weeks to get a routine appointment
Have you raised these issues with your GP?If you ring in the morning, GP's secretaries in my area laugh at the thought of getting an appointment on the same dayn and emit an attitude of take it or leave it.
When I am given appointment I then turn up punctually at the given time only to wait at the very least for an hour to be seen, and often two hours or more.
It is almost impossible to keep to appointment times in a gp's surgery. quote]
And
It is almost impossible to keep to appointment times in a gp's surgery. quote]
And it is definitely impossible to keep to appointment times when you give multiple appointments at a particular time!
Thats the way it worked in my doctor's surgery in Dublin - everyone was given a 9am appointment, and then you were put on the list in the order in which you turned up. The first time, I arrived at 8:55 and was the 15th person on the list, and found that people had started queueing for their 9am appointment from 8am, in order to get near the top of the queue!
In spain (where I live now), I pay 17E a month to BUPA. Then if I need to see a doctor, I go to their web page, and choose the type of doctor I want (e.g. eye and ear/gynecologist/traumatologist/general etc) and ring to make an appointment. Most of the time there is no problem getting an appointment for that same day, and they are full of abject apologies if they need to offer you an appointment for the next day.
I dont know why we cant have the same system in Ireland.
And it is definitely impossible to keep to appointment times when you give multiple appointments at a particular time!
Thats the way it worked in my doctor's surgery in Dublin - everyone was given a 9am appointment, and then you were put on the list in the order in which you turned up. The first time, I arrived at 8:55 and was the 15th person on the list, and found that people had started queueing for their 9am appointment from 8am, in order to get near the top of the queue!
Why bother with appointments then at all ? Why not have a first come first served basis and if an emergency comes in then obviously they have priority over the rest, at least people wouldn't be treated like fools sitting around for a few hours in the surgery, just a thought....
One GP we use doesn't have a appointments and its a nightmare. You can be waiting 2 hours to get in. Patients can be in there for 30~40mins. Another GP we use has a appointments and it works very well. You rarely wait more than 20mins.
And it is definitely impossible to keep to appointment times when you give multiple appointments at a particular time!
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