The Way things work these days

maltrab

maltrab

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Or not: See GP about finger that won't straighten, she said I will make an appointment for you to have it looked at, week later letter arrives, I have a choice to two clinic's to call to make said appointment, I call the easiest one for me to get to and give them a call, Lady tells me I cannot make the appointment over the phone, she will consult the surgeon who visits a couple of times a month, then a couple of things may happen, they write to me with a date in 6 to 8 weeks time, or refer me back to my GP to start the ball rolling all over again.
It all seems to be delay tactics these days for anything non urgent, just moving paperwork around but little gets done
 
Have to say in an emergency they are brilliant, a family member had test a few weeks again, very scary stuff she had appointments within days and follow ups the next day and results the same day, blood test results in hours, I know it can be pain in the maximus glutus at times, hope you get it sorted quickly Terry.
 
It sounds a lot like getting a specialist appointment here in the States, even with excellent health insurance. In August, I contacted the otolaryngology department in the medical and surgical practice that takes care of everything for me for an appointment with their audiologist, who prescribed my current hearing aids, to retest and to order more powerful ones if necessary. Because I hadn't seen her in more than three years, I'm viewed as a new patient. (Hereafter, I'll get in to see her at least every 2 1/2 years whether or not it's necessary!) The earliest available new patient appointment is this coming Monday. In the meantime, I'm walking around with five-and-a-half-year-old hearing aids that have been in use all of my waking hours for all of those years. Electronics wear out with use, the life expectancy for hearing aids is five years, and I know I'm not hearing as clearly as when they were new.

I've dealt with the NHS only in emergency or semi-emergency situations, once for a fractured wrist, twice for mild infections, but I got right in and was competently cared for. Here at home, the fracture would be attended to in the hospital emergency room after a very high co-pay and a wait of up to several hours, but the infections would require waiting up to 24 hours for the Walk-in Clinic to open and taking pot luck on who I see after a $10 co-pay and a wait of up to several hours.
 
My audiologist appointment just got worse. The scheduler at the local otolaryngology office phoned yesterday to change the time for the otolaryngology appointment from morning to afternoon. When I pointed out that this would require also changing the audiologist appointment that was scheduled immediately after, she checked with the audiologist to ask if I really needed to see one of the otolaryngologists first, as central scheduling had insisted. She called back this morning to tell me that I did not, but could see the audiologist directly. The catch is that central scheduling had scheduled the audiologist appointment wrong. The result is that Monday's appointment had to be postponed until December 17th.

All this nonsense is the result of dealing with a bureaucracy. I hope that by next time I need to schedule an appointment, I'll have better hearing aids that will allow me to hear on the phone so I can call the relevant office directly, rather than using the practice's online system to avoid spending most of a phone call asking the person on the other end of the call to repeat what he or she just said.
 
Marianna, you should emigrate to Holmfirth, you'd have free healthcare and someone like Nora tending any wounds you may have!!!
 
Marianna said:
My audiologist appointment just got worse. The scheduler at the local otolaryngology office phoned yesterday to change the time for the otolaryngology appointment from morning to afternoon. When I pointed out that this would require also changing the audiologist appointment that was scheduled immediately after, she checked with the audiologist to ask if I really needed to see one of the otolaryngologists first, as central scheduling had insisted. She called back this morning to tell me that I did not, but could see the audiologist directly. The catch is that central scheduling had scheduled the audiologist appointment wrong. The result is that Monday's appointment had to be postponed until December 17th.

All this nonsense is the result of dealing with a bureaucracy. I hope that by next time I need to schedule an appointment, I'll have better hearing aids that will allow me to hear on the phone so I can call the relevant office directly, rather than using the practice's online system to avoid spending most of a phone call asking the person on the other end of the call to repeat what he or she just said.
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otolaryngologists? I've no idea what they do. Perhaps they're called something different in the UK.
 
:eek2: :fp: Facepalm in advance for obvious reasons, ENT at my local Hospital sits next to HKB ............. what is HKB I hear you say??? ......................................................... Why Hands Knees and Bumpsadaisy of course! groan!!
 
captain clutterbuck said:
:eek2: :fp: Facepalm in advance for obvious reasons, ENT at my local Hospital sits next to HKB ............. what is HKB I hear you say??? ......................................................... Why Hands Knees and Bumpsadaisy of course! groan!!
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Even more groanier, :fp::fp::fp:, why is your H K BENT?... Heck, where are my tablets?
 
Barrychuckle said:
Marianna, you should emigrate to Holmfirth, you'd have free healthcare and someone like Nora tending any wounds you may have!!!
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Oh, gosh, not Nora! I'd be swathed in bandages from head to foot.

Yet another difference between British and American English. You emigrate both to and from. We emigrate from and immigrate to.

I'd give my eye teeth to immigrate to the UK, Holmfirth in particular, but the law permitting indefinite leave to remain for retirees of independent means (amounting to only £25,000 per year), was taken off the books several years ago. The reason given was that it wasn't being used enough. So, how much does it cost to keep a law on the books?!

Although tax- and charity-supported health care for all with no more hassle or wait than here in upstate New York would be a bonus, I'd make the move because I feel both safer and more comfortable in England, especially in the Yorkshire Pennines, than here at home.
 
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Sorry to hear of your difficulties Terry and Marianna.

I'm sure there is an episode where Clegg is talking in rather sarcastic terms about the difficulties involved in getting to see a doctor, something like having to be unwell to fit in with appointment times, but can't remember which one it is (if, indeed, I am remembering correctly!) Can anyone help?
 
I know my problem is very low on the scale of things, but talking to neighbours and friends for routine and basic issues it seems the more recent way the systems deal with them it to move folk along a paper chain, often with no end result, our local GP has told several of the locals that whatever their problem is, it could take months to see a consultant, and he recommends writing a letter and seeing the same consultant privately and in a few days, if you cannot afford to do this, the GP will write to the consultant and you then wait for them to get in touch, you normally get a letter within a couple of weeks inviting you to call to make an appointment, when you manage to get through, as these numbers are often unattended or constantly busy, they will then explaining that they will put you on the waiting list for an appointment, so they will then write to you sometimes offering several locations that you may wish to attend, you pick one of them for convenience, so you then call the number offered for this location, if you're lucky you manage to speak to someone on this number,who again will put you on their waiting list,so you then wait for the letter to arrive, with the actual appointment, this can be many weeks after first seeing your GP, who makes it very clear not to ask the surgery to chase the matter up it is beyond their control.

You just hope in all this time your problem does not become more serious along with hoping the the date you now have to see the consultant does not get cancelled for one reason or another
 
I have experienced these issues recently not me personally but with my Mum who is 95 . She had two issues one was with her hearing and needs new hearing aids including a hearing test . To have the test she needed to have her ears washed out, two cancelled appointments later, both last minute and cancelled by the clinics, after two months they finally rearranged the appointment and she had them washed , they did the test, took impressions for new hearing aids and repaired her existing hearing aids , which she has had for at least 5 years however, she is still waiting for the appointment to have them fitted and that's likely now to be January/February because ENT have a huge waiting list.

She has a second issue she had a Cataract operation a few years ago which helped her vision but subsequently , as with 25% of patients, she developed Posterior Capsule Opacification or PCO basically the lens capsule, where the artificial lens was placed in the original operation , has an issue where cells left over from the original operation grow over the rear bit of that lens capsule causing blurred vision . Glasses are of no use so at present reading anything is impossible for her unless the lettering is two inches high. The corrective laser treatment is a 5 to 10 minute session . She was referred at the start of September and her appointment has just come through for 13th December but that is only after her GP wrote two further referral letters explaining that the impact on her quality of life was being effected because in essence two of her 5 basic senses were impaired .

Who knows how long she will wait to get her new hearing aids given they seem prone to cancelling clinics but at least after a long delay she should get some relief regarding her sight. :mad:
 
JBCat said:
Sorry to hear of your difficulties Terry and Marianna.

I'm sure there is an episode where Clegg is talking in rather sarcastic terms about the difficulties involved in getting to see a doctor, something like having to be unwell to fit in with appointment times, but can't remember which one it is (if, indeed, I am remembering correctly!) Can anyone help?
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I think it was in Quick Quick Slow that Clegg says "You've got to make an appointment, you can't just be ill when you feel like it"
 
Roger said:
I think it was in Quick Quick Slow that Clegg says "You've got to make an appointment, you can't just be ill when you feel like it"
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Thank you Roger, that is the one I was thinking about.

Things can't have been any better back in 1990/1991 when the episode dates from!
 
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