Forest Hill Road Practice - in Meltdown ?

[nxjen]

There are many other reasons for phoning a doctor's surgery, including test results, information for insurance forms etc. I had cause to phone regarding the latter earlier in the year and must have been talking to the receptionist for about 10 minutes who took pains to find out the information I was seeking (it was mostly to do with dates) and was extremely patient with me, even to the extent of phoning me back when I accidentally pressed the wrong button on my phone and cut us off. I'm very sorry to learn of the difficulties there are at present regarding appointments and I hope they are resolved soon. I reckon morale amongst the admin staff must be very low.

[ruffers]

I understand there are other reasons, fair enough, but there surely is a way to manage calls if someone needs time spent with them rather than just leaving people hanging on.

I have now been on for 32 minutes and am still 2nd in the queue...

[LondonMix]

It took me about 30 minutes to get through today at 10:30am. It is something they should address if possible.

[sheilarose]

Maybe things are about to get better. I called this afternoon, got put straight through and got an appointment at a time and date that suited me. This has not been my experience recently so it was a pleasant surprise. Also, after every single repeat prescription being messed up in some way for the past several months, my most recent one went through smoothly in the timescale promised. I see they have employed a practice pharmacist, which might help free up the doctors a bit.

[EastdulwichNewbie]

I just wanted to say that although I've found it tricky to get appointments at times, when I've needed to take my baby to see a doctor urgently, they have always managed to see us. Other mums I know have had a similar experience.

[DadOf4]

NHS crisis/funding ? ageing population ? too many people going to Doctors for trivial things ?

Yes, maybe these are all factors.

However, from personal experience and based on speaking to some GP's I know - I think that there is a massive range in the "customer service" & efficiency at different doctors surgeries. And IMO this is down purely to how well the administrative side of their business is run (yes, they are businesses)

A typical GP surgery has many 1000's of "customers" - customers who, in the 21st century expect to be able to transact quickly, and get service when they want. Some surgeries do that well. Some don?t.

With those many 1000's of customers, somewhere like FHR has a handful of Doctors (highly skiiled professionals, but cusotmer service amateurs) and admin staff, struggling to keep their heads above water and probably with no experience in improving processes, etc

Lets think about one of those processes

FHR has decided to "play" the government targets by differentiating between emergency and non-emergency appointments.

The only way to access an emergency appointment is to phone at 8am and get in a queue with everybody else. For the ?hardworking families? that this government like to talk about, this is a really inaccessible system: both me and my wife are either at (or travelling to) work at that time.

Their phones are manned by a small number of receptionists, so wait times are completely unacceptable

This process is not fit for purpose

So, how to fix:

1. Online services

I believe FHR have an online booking system (and I believe that some of these systems can even do repeat presecriptions and other interactions)

However, when I asked about it at the surgery they scratched their heads and eventually gave me a form to complete (which of course, I lost)

They need to heavily promote (or ?near mandate?) the use of this system and make it easily accessible. It should become the default way of getting an appointment. Every online booking is a admin person freed up to deal with other things. I would hope that it would also allow people to do more thorough searches for available appointments and notifications of appointments becoming available

2. Use an out-sourced booking service for phone bookings

The ?is it an emergency? question is the only value that a receptionist currently adds to the booking process. Other than that, it?s a simple time slot booking service. And lets face it, the receptionists at FHR are not medical professionals and don?t really add much value

I don?t know what percentage of their inbound calls this would take away ? but again I would expect it to be significant.

Again , freeing up staff for dealing with more complex enquiries and also meaning that people are not on hold for 30 minutes

I?m sure tha theres lots of other areas, but the point is that these guys need to think more like a customer service environment and maybe consider getting in some outside help

[bobbsy]

Hear hear!

[Sue]

Hear hear too!

[alice]

I would assume reception staff have access to info about patients that is taken into account when giving out appointments.

suggestions [online booking and outsourcing booking] take no account of this and would result in the web savvy, automated call users taking over.

I would say that excludes 30% of patients who don't/ cant access the above.

[George Orwell]

A summary of the 33 responses to my original post is:

The doctors are good ? tick

Admin, including receptionists ? not at all good.

Very urgent appointments are dealt with in a satisfactory way ? good, tick

Routine and follow-up appointments are not at all easy to obtain ? not good.

DadOf4, you have hit the nail on the head with just two of your statements:

?FHR has decided to "play" the government targets by differentiating between emergency and non-emergency appointments.?

?FHR has a handful of Doctors (highly skilled professionals, but customer service amateurs) and admin staff, struggling to keep their heads above water and probably with no experience in improving processes, etc ?

Separately and long way from London, a family member is a young GP who knows his stuff very well, but hasn't got a clue about how to run a business. He is in two minds about staying in the UK and whatever he does I am urging him to get some business / management training. Medical training does not cover management and then one day ? because you are a good doctor you become a partner rather than a salaried GP. That's when the trouble starts ? the government expects you to be a GP and simultaneously run a business with a considerable turnover when you've never so much as run a market stall in the past.

I still have some slight sympathy for the predicament of the partners in FHR but it's been shown that they need help and they should spend some of their not inconsiderable income on bringing it in.

DadOf4, maybe you and I should offer our help !

[DadOf4]

>DadOf4, maybe you and I should offer our help !

yes - I'm half temped

I run an IT business that has a very significant cusotmer service element. I employ very highly qualified IT people (analogy = doctors) but I wouldn't dream of getting those highly trained people to try and run cusotmer service. I have a cusotmer service manager to do that - he spends his life trying to improve the cusotmer experience and our processes that support that. Where approrpiate, he brings in other skills - none of them are our core IT skiils - they are process skills

@alice

The fact that the very last thing I do when booking an appointment at FHR is give my name, leads me to beleive that having access to my records is completly irrelevant.

Also - on your point that 30% of people would be excluded - hmmmmm - I dont know the figures but I bet theres nowhere near 30% of people without internet access. And, the whole point here, is that efficiencies with the 70 (or whatever) % would mean that the others arent waiting for 30-40 minutes on the phone

[sunbob]

I have had 2 experiences in the last week of incompetency from their admin side 1 of them coupled with apathy from reception staff. I will be making a complaint and copy it to maybe a councillor or MP as this experience gives me no confidence that their complaints procedure would be any better.

[EDmummy]

After suffering our own quite significant problems with the management of this practice, I've been blown away today by the very hardworking GPs. I think the best way to get an more immediate response from the practice is to attend a patients meeting and (calmly) voice your concerns and demand a response and timescale for improvement. Going through your MP would take a long time to get a response and would unlikely do anything other than encourage penalisation of the practice rather than encourage improvement. Another avenue would be to write to the CCG with your complaint.

[sheilarose]

I had high hopes that things had improved, but I have just waited over 15 minutes for my call to be answered only to be told that the next available appointment is on 29th February -- not with a specific doctor or anything tricky like that. I really need to move surgeries. Is there ANYwhere fairly locally that might be an improvement?

[Jacqui5254]

I hate to see the Drs good/Receptionists bad divide. Sue, one of the reception staff showed me nothing but courtesy and kindness over several calls I made. Her suggestion of seeing a Senior Nurse Practitioner turned out to be just as good an option as my 'I need to see a dr' request and I was seen within hours. Also, the Practise Pharmacist has an important role to play. I don't know why the doctors are being rated so highly when at the same time don't seem to be able to manage their surgery, despite being on the top end of the payroll.

Frankly, I feel sorry for anyone [ie receptionists] who have an administrative job and who are managed by senior colleagues [gps] who have don't have the skills, time or training to manage. Can't be a happy environment to work in every day.

[Cats_pyjamas]

Currently I'm on hold to them.

I have been on hold for 37 minutes.

I am still only position 4 in the queue.

[wonderwoman]

I would say register for online where you can book appointments and get repeat prescriptions yourself. I've found that useful for myself. However last year I completed forms for my 3 children and heard nothing. I called them yesterday and they said up till recently they were not able to register anyone under 16 but now can so would send the forms straightaway. I asked why they did not let me know that rather than leaving me waiting for two months, faced with silence. But really if I had not rang they would have no doubt left the forms at the bottom of the basket. If blood results come through they also never ring to give you the results or what happens next. Wonder if the GPs ever cast eyes on them. There is a meeting on 25th and would urge people to attend to relay concerns. I've been with the surgery for 40 years and it's had better days lets just say.

[Cats_pyjamas]

Ah, I was just trying to find out if a referral had been made.

I was on hold for 57 minutes! 57!!!

And the outcome? "Dunno....everyone's on lunch right now. Try again tomorrow"

%*|?~BSJ:?;8:&!!!!!

Is the patients' meeting confirmed? Sign me up!

[intexasatthe moment]

details of mtg on 25 th Feb

http://fhrgp.co.uk/patient-group/page/patient-participation-group.html

no minutes available for last mtg in November ...

[wonderwoman]

There is a link there of the nov meeting on the website albeit brief. Dr Masaba and pharmacist attended i think

[gerritsmith]

No wonder you can't get appointments to see a dr in this surgery. Looking at their website for making appointments, it appears that out of eight doctors at the surgery, only four are seeing patients for two hours a day at the most. Sometimes only two or three are on duty working just two hours a day. On average eight doctors work eight hours in total in a day, at the most. This is scandalous. Doctors are hardly there in the surgery to see patients. They get paid to work full time but on average it seems each one to be working less than an hour a day. Does Jeremy Hunt know that GPs in this surgery are getting full time wages for doing hardly any work?

[dc]

gerritsmith Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> No wonder you can't get appointments to see a dr

> in this surgery. Looking at their website for

> making appointments, it appears that out of eight

> doctors at the surgery, only four are seeing

> patients for two hours a day at the most.

> Sometimes only two or three are on duty working

> just two hours a day. On average eight doctors

> work eight hours in total in a day, at the most.

> This is scandalous. Doctors are hardly there in

> the surgery to see patients. They get paid to work

> full time but on average it seems each one to be

> working less than an hour a day. Does Jeremy Hunt

> know that GPs in this surgery are getting full

> time wages for doing hardly any work?

I assume this is somebody working on their stand-up routine.

[JoeLeg]

gerritsmith Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> No wonder you can't get appointments to see a dr

> in this surgery. Looking at their website for

> making appointments, it appears that out of eight

> doctors at the surgery, only four are seeing

> patients for two hours a day at the most.

> Sometimes only two or three are on duty working

> just two hours a day. On average eight doctors

> work eight hours in total in a day, at the most.

> This is scandalous. Doctors are hardly there in

> the surgery to see patients. They get paid to work

> full time but on average it seems each one to be

> working less than an hour a day. Does Jeremy Hunt

> know that GPs in this surgery are getting full

> time wages for doing hardly any work?

Got any actual proof of any of that? Seriously, do you?

[Eileen]

George Orwell Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> ?FHR has a handful of Doctors (highly skilled

> professionals, but customer service amateurs) and

> admin staff, struggling to keep their heads above

> water and probably with no experience in improving

> processes, etc ?

the government expects you to be

> a GP and simultaneously run a business with a

> considerable turnover when you've never so much as

> run a market stall in the past.

> I still have some slight sympathy for the

> predicament of the partners in FHR but it's been

> shown that they need help and they should spend

> some of their not inconsiderable income on

> bringing it in.

Isn't the role of the Practice Manager supposed to cover all this? See https://nationalcareersservice.direct.gov.uk/advice/planning/jobprofiles/Pages/gppracticemanager.aspx Maybe they have someone in the job who is not able to deliver, or the job/role description is inadequate.

What do patients there think of the Patients Forum? Does that work OK? I have been once so don't have enough experience. Wouldn't that be a useful place to raise these points?

[gerritsmith]

Just look at their website for making appointments. One dr appears to be seeing patients for just two hours a day. And only upto four are on duty for two hours a day. When you phone to make an appointment to see a doctor you have previously seen s/he is never available. Eight doctors are sharing the work of a couple doctors. A scandal.