It is time for a look at the comments left on our Patient Satisfaction Survey and the Friends and Family Test again.
On arrival to the GP surgery I thought that I was booked in ,I waited nearly an hour and went to see who I was seeing to be told I did not get booked in and then I could not be seen has she was now booked up .this is not acceptable .
We agree. It is unacceptable if this happened due to an error made on our side. The clinician is not at fault here. However, if this patient did report to reception and inform them of their arrival, this was an oversight by the receptionist. There are many reasons why this can occur. Human error is the most common one. Sometimes the computer system crashes and in the restart, it is forgotten to arrive the patient. Another time the receptionist may be busy doing something and gets distracted by this. It is also possible the patient assumed the receptionist had noticed their arrival and thought this would lead to marking them as arrived. Or that the receptionist simply didn’t hear the patient. We apologise for this oversight. If you ever start to wonder if you may not have been marked as arrived, please check with the receptionist that this has occurred. Often it will be because the clinician is running behind, but it doesn’t hurt to double-check.
In the present climate theres not a lot you could do to improve with cut backs on each doctors nurses etc
Thank you for your support. We try the best we can under the circumstances.
My visit was with a new nurse and she was very pleasant and good at her job. I hope she has a good career there. (Ellie).
We are happy to hear this patient had a good experience with the new Nursing Associate, Ellie. We agree we hope she will be with us for many years.
Excellent service , communication, time allocation,
Thank you. We aim to provide the best service possible.
I was invited to see a nurse for my yearly M O T .In the email it said I should wear a mask -when I arrived I was the only person in a mask !!! Mixed messages
Although we still recommend the wearing of masks in the clinical areas, this is a personal choice now for patients and clinicians. With the resurgence of Covid and new strains, things may change again. We follow the national guidance on this, but please use a face covering if you wish.
X was the gp I saw. Awful experience, X didn’t want to listen to my problems about my pain levels regarding 2 chronic conditions I have. Was unwilling to talk about a plan or anything to try help with the pain, even after I told X I have to spend most day in bed the pain is that bad. All X had to say was fibromyalgia sometimes goes away, it doesnt and X really needs educating on this illness, and that until it goes away I should just stay in bed suffering in high amount of pain! As a result of this I called 111 who advised I go to a&e where I was made to feel I was waisting people time until I was seen by the gp there who actually listened to me and has now prescribed some pain medication and advised me on some pain management all of which X could have done had X actually been bothered about X’s patients
We are sorry to hear this patient had this experience.
Often this is due to misunderstandings rather than an unwillingness of the doctor to listen. But, when things like this happen, it once more shows us how important it is that the patient’s and the doctor’s agenda are aligned. How important it is that a doctor doesn’t simply listen, but also shows this listening. Both in action and in the way the doctor acts towards the patient.
Doctors can be under extreme pressure. In those times it is especially important they practice self-care and take a break every now and then. Once they have taken this break they can then face their patients with renewed energy.
Whatever happened during this consultation, it is obvious the agenda of the doctor and the patient weren’t aligned. We have made the GP in question aware of this comment.
Good job I got a face to face as the person I saw could see I was clearly showing signs of fatigue which I hadn’t picked up. This leads to blood being taken and nothing to do with my initial reason for the visit.
Occasionally there are other problems the clinician picks up on. Sometimes these are more important than the reason the patient attended for in the first place. It will not always be possible to deal with both issues in the same appointment, but we would hope another appointment would then be arranged to deal with the other problem. We’re glad the patient was happy with the outcome of this visit.
Making test results available in full either emailed or through the NHS app, as some other practices do (Sheffield)
Patients always have been able to request this access if they wished. A form is available at reception to request this. Prospective access to medical records has also recently been enabled, which means data from the date this was enabled is visible to patients via the NHS App. Any new patients registering with the practice will only see what has been added to their record since their registration.
Seen by a brilliant nurse
Only thing is getting to see a doctor but otherwise I am happy with the system
That is a really common thing to hear. Yes, we do have a problem with capacity not being in balance with demand. A national problem, really. We would love to increase the number of appointments by taking on more staff and doctors. There are two major problems with that. The first is that there is a national shortage of doctors. The second problem is that if we could get more doctors, we wouldn’t have anywhere to put them. We only have ten clinical rooms spread over 2 sites. The clinicians are currently hot-seating to create as much capacity as we can. With close to 7500 patients (and growing), this is a big task. Although we’ve previously enquired about the possibility of closing our list to new patients, we were informed we would not gain approval to do so. All we can do is continue as we are doing and provide the service we can. When our capacity for appointments is reached, patients will need to be signposted elsewhere.
You acted really quick with my appointments, and have helped when I needed advice from yourselves and the doctor
We are happy to hear this patient was happy with our service.
Clean and appointment was on time. Easy to park.
We’re pleased to hear that. We can’t take credit for the cleanliness of the building. This is the achievement of the excellent cleaning team. Appointments may not always be on time, but the clinicians do their best to keep to time as much as possible. Emergencies and other issues may delay them. I suspect this patient went to Grimethorpe as the Cudworth car park is often full to capacity.
Use a countdown system when I phone up
We’re not sure when the patient last phoned the surgery. Both in Grimethorpe and in Cudworth, patients should get onto a queuing system that informs them which number they are in the queue.
Always ready to listen and help me
Very friendly staff
What are we doing particularly well?
Getting appointments booked even at short notice and prioritising patients
