The Lodge Health Partnership

I joined the practice in 2019 and so far my experience has been poor or very poor. Obtaining an appointment by telephone is a lengthy and frustrating process. The caller is greeted with over a minute of messages then placed in a queue during the messages are repeated with some addons. The messages are not helpful and appear to deflect the patient from getting through by encouraging them to use another method of communication. Also they can confuse - for example knowing what is urgent. When the caller gets through and asks for an appointment this will be weeks ahead and only by telephone. Sometimes if the caller persists an earlier appointment may be found - it rather places the receptionist of process of triage for which they are not qualified. All first consultations are by telephone thereby removing one of the observation element element from diagnosis. On first consultation (always by telephone) the doctor decides if a face to face consultation is necessary thereby introducing a delay in obtaining any treatment. It is rare that I speak to the GP assigned to me. Every consultation seems to be with a different GP removing any continuity. It is appreciated that doctors rely on notes but they are dealing with human beings each of whom are different with different needs which can't be seen in notes. In the most recent consultation I was lucky to speak to the same GP twice. The GP wrote a letter to the haematologist a week ago. This letter has not yet been typed and sent because of lack of clerical staff leading to further delay (in addition to having to wait for the haematologist's reply) and no doubt putting more pressure on clinical staff.