I have been a patient here for over 20 years and in the last 5 years have struggled to get an appointment. What seems to come as a shock to the staff on reception and answering the telephone is that I work full time and am not able to wait in the 5 minute surgery (when there's availability) and an appointment in the evening/late afternoon or first appointment of the day would be required. However, those types of appointments are like unicorn dust and just don't exist. I now see that the surgery has close to 9000 patients and fewer doctors than 20 years ago so are unlikely to be able to see a fraction of the role call. The surgery, imo, has grown too large and greedy drawing down as much funding as possible by taking on more and more patients but they have not given any thought to the capacity and capability of their surgery being able to accommodate the large number of patients. The last time I had an appointment at 9:00 I was there for 8:45 however, the doctors did not have the courtesy to be ready for patients at the appointment time. In fact, they did not come down stairs to the practice rooms until well after 9.00 causing a knock on effect on the rest of the appointments for the day. I have also been at the tail end of the appointment system with an appointment at 17:40 but didn't get seen until 18:30. When I saw the doctor I was told that they'd had a doctor ring in sick, why couldn't receptionists have given out this little nugget of information on the numerous times I asked if the doctor had overlooked my appointment? I have a chronic illness that requires appointments but it's got to the stage that I'm begging the hospital to continue my care rather than trying to be seen by a doctor in this surgery, which is receiving NHS funding to see me!! The surgery is supposed to have a recall system for patients with chronic illnesses so that reviews can take place. I wasn't aware of this until I was questioned by the hospital on the last date I had a prescription review; they then advised I needed to check with the surgery. When I asked it was an 'OOPS!' moment for them I'd been overlooked and should have been recalled every 6 months from the month my birthdate is in. I have set the ball rolling to transfer to another practice that has the capacity to handle the number of patients it has before my health is seriously put at risk.
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