The NHS plays Humpty Dumpty at the GP's surgery, but The King only has so many men inside his A&E.

Found this in drafts, wanted to post it, waited 11 years to be posted, never ever posted.
NHS so much worse now.
Hooray.
Mom says she still has faith in it, after seeing the alternative.👀
- Master Polkadot

This post is going to be a LONG one. But if you're interested in how the NHS works or already know but want to shake your fists in unison, then please read the whole post. Wouldn't it be interesting if all of us facing this blogged about every NHS encounter we had? I'd love to collate that blogroll:)

I'm really grateful that we have the NHS in the UK. I have poor health, but it gets managed. It is a tedious task but it gets done. I am looked after (mostly) for the cost of our taxes and I know that I would not have that luxury in other places-like South Africa, where my parents live.

But it makes me really sad and frustrated when I walk into a GP's surgery and can see EVERYTHING that's wrong with the NHS. I've changed surgeries 3 times since living in this house and I'm on the hunt again.

Recently, I've been struggling with more than just falls. I have bad appetite but huge weight gain and absolutely no energy, and little cuts and bruises take forever to heal.

I've been trying to see my doctor for ages-but here's how our appointment system works. The reception staff are only allowed to book appointments up to a week in advance (this varies between surgeries-but the furthest I've found in my area is two weeks). There are two kinds of appointments: "Advance" and "Book on the day". The ratio is determined by a number of factors, but if they think it's going to be busy then they'll block off more of that days appointments for "book on the day" (like
after a bank holiday when folk have gone a few days without seeing a doctor). To get a book on the day you need to phone at 8am on the day you'd like to see the doc man (or lady before I get yelled
 at;)) This means everyone is phoning at 8am. You'd think then we'll call at 08:30, but the trouble with that is then you are right at the back of the queue on the phone and by the time the music stops, receptionists have nothing to give you. Now you have one more day that you can try for an advance, because you phoned yesterday and there were none but today has opened up a new day (stay with me now), but the receptionist has just spoken to at least 10 people who missed book on the day so they have booked up all the appointments for next week *insert whatever day today is here*. What's your next choice? You can present at the walk in centre. Our town has two of these...one which is staffed by nurses for minor injuries and one which is staffed by GP's for illness. Our towns GP walk in happens to be based at the surgery where I'm registered and is currently only staffed by ONE GP. Remember, this is for the town-not just overflow patients from "our" surgery. Our walk in centre advertises it's opening hours from 8am to 8pm, with an average waiting time of 2-3 hours. The reality is that if you present after 17:05pm you will be turned away BECAUSE of that waiting time, The doctor is likely to see his last patient at 8pm, but he also expects to clock off at 8pm (and frankly after being the only GP to see how many patients in the last 12 hours perhaps he has earned it).

You still have one more option before you resign yourself to a trip to A&E. You can go home and call the "NHS 111 service", If their call handlers decide (based on a scripted computer programme) that you need to see a doctor, they will take your details and a nurse or someone with that kind of qualification will call you back. This can take up to two hours, most of the callbacks I get, happen within an hour. Now s/he goes through the same questions and adds a few and agrees you need to see an  out of hours doctor. S/he again takes your details and passes them on to an out of hours doctor, who also wants to talk to you over the phone. I've waited up to four hours for that call, and as out of hours only opens at 6pm, it's 10pm now and I've been trying to get an appointment since 8am. Now you've finally managed to speak to a real life GP it's up to him what happens next. Is he arranging for a prescription to be faxed to your chosen pharmacy? (then you're probably waiting until tomorrow or the day after to start treatment), Is he going to ask you to come and collect some medication (or send someone else-you'll get a 7 day supply and have to see your own GP after that (are you rolling your eyes again?) Perhaps he'll say he needs to see you-now you're going to his office in the middle of the night unless you can justify him coming to you. I do this if I can because aside from the kids, if Im traipsing around in the dark I have a higher chance of stumbling and in the pain that I'm in, I'm not driving and Lordbob would need to stay with the kids. Do you know that when a doctor arrives at your house between 1 and 3am, the neighbours three houses down tend to be woken by the doorbell too!

 Who is the aliens, question.

Theres like, a follower here and they just called "The Alien's"
Like who.

I wanna know.

Sound like Joe Rogan. "WHO ARE THE ALIENS? WHY ARE THEY FOLLOWING THIS BLOG? WHO?"

Oumuamau. 

 Just isnt very big text size.

We back, we big.

Master Polkadot in the house for today.

That one picture of Slim Shady doing the motion where he's throwing something at you because he doesn't like you all too much. Or something.

😀💆

found blog site.

found blog site.

found blog site.

thank you mom (not dead, sitting next to me)

Lot of space for typing, not enough typing to be done in space.