Dodgy GP surgeries exposed

[Osem]

Inspectors have exposed a catalogue of failings at some GP practices in England, with drugs stored incorrectly and rooms so dirty they had maggots.

The review by the Care Quality Commission of over 900 practices said there were too many "basic failings".

The checks were targeted mainly at those practices deemed to be high risk ahead of next year's rollout of the first national GP inspection regime.

Overall, concerns were expressed about a third of practices

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25337908

I wonder if the 'ratings' are going to be made as public as they are with regard to food hygiene. Not much point having them if very few patients ever get to see them.

[richard s]

You can also wait up to six hours in an ambulance just to get into A&E...

standards have dropped..

[Stuart]

You may well find that if they sort out GP surgeries, more people will go to them rather than A&E, which will bring A&E queues down.

Our local Health Authority did a survey and found that a lot of the people treated by our local A&E were actually suffering from things that could be more effectively (and cheaply) treated by the GP. They even went to the expense of closing the inpatient part of the smallest hospital in the area, and converting the whole thing into a state of the art Minor Injuries unit, where GPs could send patients with minor injuries, and even come with them and perform minor surgery, if needed.

Apparently, very few GPs used it.

[alanbjames]

My old doctors surgery was a nightmare. my GP wouldnt accept the existance of an illness called fibromyalgia even tho i was diagnosed it by a specialist and its documented in journals.

[Osem]

Thanks to another thread here, I checked the hygiene rating of a local restaurant we were planning to go to last weekend. I was so shocked to see the 1 star 'urgent improvement required' that we went elsewhere. Of course swapping GP's isn't as simple and there isn't as much choice but displaying ratings prominently ought to help to drive up standards.

[denphone]

Originally Posted by alanbjames

My old doctors surgery was a nightmare. my GP wouldnt accept the existance of an illness called fibromyalgia even tho i was diagnosed it by a specialist and its documented in journals.

l remember before my main condition was diagnosed 13 and a half years ago as l went to two different GP's as l was increasingly desperate for a GP to listen to me but lol and behold one basically called me a hypercondriac whilst the other gave me anti depression tablets and what then transpired about two months later is my partner had to call out another doctor during the night as my condition deteriorated significantly and thus l was sent to the local hospital where a excellent cardiac consultant straight away knew there was something seriously wrong and hours later told me in the HD unit that l needed to be airlifted to a specialist heart hospital in London to have a LVAD implanted into me to save me life.

When I first saw the maggots headline I thought they were calling the patients maggots....

[Taf]

I cannot complain about cleanliness in our local GP surgery, but the services they offer are going downhill rapidly. 22 persons maximum in the mornings, 11 if only 1 GP is there, and you must arrive before 10:30 to have any hope of being seen. Many are passed immediately to the nurses by admin staff, IF the nurses have turned up. Evening appointments are like hen's teeth within a week, and you HAVE to turn up even if you get better.

Only fault with my gp centre is I can guarantee being over 45 minutes past my appointment time when I see him apart from that it's a good medical centre, things like this give the chance for a shocking headline but unless the info is easily available not much else.

[Mick Fisher]

Originally Posted by RizzyKing

Only fault with my gp centre is I can guarantee being over 45 minutes past my appointment time when I see him apart from that it's a good medical centre, things like this give the chance for a shocking headline but unless the info is easily available not much else.

Appointments are a thing of the past at my Med Centre. They tell you to turn up, wait and hope you get seen. If not then tough luck try again tomorrow. Even if you manage to see someone they will just try to fob you off.

It's no wonder A&E are swamped with people seeking treatment and advice.

[Gavin78]

A lot of this is also down to the gov allowing GP's to take over control of things like Drugs from the NHS, We recently had to report some GP's because they had drugs down (expensive ones) as being used by the patients and they weren't actually given them as they never needed them.

Because we don't always need to check the patients drug list until needed as only have a list of what we issue for the GP to give we don't often see what the GP's are doing.

there are a lot of practices setting up and charging for Drugs that don't ever get used

---------- Post added at 23:50 ---------- Previous post was at 23:37 ----------

Originally Posted by RizzyKing

Only fault with my gp centre is I can guarantee being over 45 minutes past my appointment time when I see him apart from that it's a good medical centre, things like this give the chance for a shocking headline but unless the info is easily available not much else.

The problem is GP's don't often see what they are being faced with which often I see 10 min appointments run into 20 mins, I would hate the GP to kick me out after 10 mins if we hadn't finished it's a catch 22 really some just time waste the GP.

we do triage in ours but noticed lately you can't even get a ring back on the same day as they want to know if it's an emergency for that now