By Peter Hughes, Patients Participation Group
As promised in these columns 2 months ago, the Patient Participation Group arranged with the Shepperton Residents Association that doctors, and the Practice Manager, would speak to the public in the Village Hall on Sep-tember 21st. The first to speak was Dr Rogers, who had been 33 years in post. She well un-derstood the anger and frustration patients felt about appointments, and recalled her start in Shepperton, “the good old days” when there had been no appointments system: patients just showed up and waited. There was a need to embrace change, which younger patients perceived and accepted more readily. Prob-lems preceded the pandemic. Every GP was under such pressure that many were leaving. Even doctors are potential patients.
The Practice Manager Caroline Self then went through the access arrangements, starting with the well-being boxes for minor problems, the availability of 111 calls (119 for Covid), and the help pharmacies could offer. When pa-tients used the Get Help section of the web-site, the reception team allocated these re-quests to doctors for triage. The LIVI service was unsuitable for complex or long term problems; where help with transport was needed doctors would agree a time. When all doctors’ appointments for the day are booked, the website closes.
She described how a new staff member was writing care plans and how doctors visited care homes; the practice was trying to recruit a paramedic who would work out how to re-duce the number of visits patients had to make.
Dr Burgess described a typical day for a GP, which was not limited to the 27 appointments often scheduled, currently requiring cleaning of kit and chairs after each; there were also 20 (sometimes 50) pathology results to write up plus Covid results, hospital referrals to write, numerous e-mails, extra duties such as meet-ings, the training of new doctors or other health professionals, mandatory training, ap-praisal documentation, and, alas, handling complaints. The duty doctor had to check on colleagues; there were emergencies, home visits, and. repeat prescriptions.
The first speaker from the floor asked why appointments had become so much more dif-ficult to secure during the pandemic. The reply pointed out that as the crisis eased more patients were coming forward with other problems: the rule of 10 minutes, one problem only, had had to be abandoned. The Practice was seeking to recruit another doctor: they were hard to find. Locums had become una-vailable, and it took 5 to 7 years to train new doctors. The building was too small anyway. The number of patients had been some 13,000 for 20 years.
Another speaker spoke of the phone line cut-ting of after 11 minutes. The software permit-ting callers to learn where they were in the queue had failed. Some 200 people rang at 8 am each day. The EMIS system, adopted throughout NW Surrey, was described. The NHS app was best for verifying information released by hospitals. Preventative medicine was returning. It was now unusual to be able always to see the same GP. Face to face en-counters had never been discontinued; the campaigns by certain newspapers was de-plored. The number of doctors was much the same as 20 years ago, but problems had be-come much more complex
There were very few “no-shows” nowadays. Shouting at receptionists was deplored: they were often reduced to tears. By this stage it was apparent that the mood of the meeting was deeply sympathetic to the doctors, and several speakers recorded compliments, espe-cially for their coming to this meeting.
The doctors now left the hall, to appreciative applause.