Telephone appointments - phew

[mikeydt1]

here we go again the issue of hospital telephone appointments.

during the lockdown and with my diabetes running rampant i was referred to the hospital diabetic clinic. gets a phone call from this nurse who only wanted me to try medication which i was all ready taking, yeah and then wanted me to take medication which i couldn't take. then decides nothing can be done, yeah and only discharges me. unknown to me my Hba1c had increased so where the hell were the blood tests? luckily i have now driven them back down and i know dam well many things could of been done but instead took the easy route of passing the buck back to my doctors.

roll on just before the virus struck i had attended my first physio but then during lockdown i gets a phone call and only get a leaflet sent with various exercises. all very well but because these are for the spine one needs to be careful as if they are done wrong then more damage can be done.

rolls on this week and you guess it discharged only to be told to go back through doctors when ready, eh!

to me it seems that hospital appointments are okay for trivial stuff but for anything else people do need to be seen.

what next another telephone appointment for my bowel disorder which i have all ready deferred twice, since when am i able to examine my inners and it may be through the lack of been seen that a mass was missed!

i only hate to think what will happen after my scans another phone call and get me to lay there trying to examine myself does the surgeon have some secret thing so they can see and feel down a phone line?

well that are my issues with these non f2f appointments would be interested to hear from others about these appointments.

 

[helli]

I have had two 6 monthly diabetes reviews since lock down. They were with DSNs from the hospital that I know.
I was able to get my blood tests done at my local GP's surgery (with mask and temperature taken) beforehand.
Apart from the "how are you feeling about Covid?", the appointment was pretty close to what I have had face to face.

I work from home so I am used to phone and conference calls rather than face to face so felt no discomfort and no frustration about a telephone call about medical matters.
In fact, it was better because, overall, it too less time. No need to travel there and back and no need to wait around because they are always running late.

Personally, I hope this new, more efficient practice continues after the pandemic.

 

[Sally71]

It depends what they are for. If it's only to discuss how you are getting on with current medication etc then phone appointments are fine, definitely better than nothing. Long before covid hit our GP surgery were trying to triage people over the phone and then only offer you a face to face appointment if they thought you really needed one, I think to try and cut down on the number of time wasters who book appointments and then don’t turn up. But obviously if you need bloods done, or if it’s the type of complaint which is impossible to assess without actually seeing the affected body part, then a phone conversation isn’t much good! The last hba1c we had done was in March, June appointment was on the phone due to covid, September was supposed to be in person but daughter had to self isolate due to a positive covid case at her school so we had to change that one to phone. Next one is January, hope that one can be face to face so that we can get hba1c done again, who knows the way things are going though

 

[adrian1der]

I spoke to our GP the other day. One of his children had symptoms so the family was tested and 48 hours later he hadn't had the result so was having to work from home.....

 

[MarkGeordie]

Even prior to Covid my surgery offered phone appointments where appropriate and some practice nurse clinics were done over the telephone.

 

[Ditto]

I've seen nobody about nowt, I think they've forgotten about me. Can't remember the last time I had a diabetes review. 🙄

 

[mikeydt1]

well back again to this topic and you just can't make this up. nurse rings this morning asked me how i was getting on with the situation i am in so went blah and blah and so on. even when she knew i wasn't 100% then told me that their service is been disbanded so they can concentrate on those with the virus and are ringing round to discharge people, what the hell.

so in our area if you don't have covid then basically the health care is what i can only describe as poor to say the least. if you don't have covid and have some other issue then forget about it even if it results in death!

there is a news article on this forum about a lady whose cancer was delayed only to find out it had spread and too late.

and there is me thinking the NHS was for everyone seems i am wrong.

 

[trophywench]

What actual service was this nurse from @mikeydt1 ?

 

[Docb]

@mikeydt1. That sounds crazy. Can I suggest you e-mail your MP (you can find him on the parliament website I think) with your story and ask him how this reconciles with all the rhetoric about the NHS being "open for business" for non-covid work.