Grumble Thread

[cria]

Can't ever seem to get any watercress these days. If I cast my mind back far enough (to c. 1834) ...

Your post was at 2013; surely your memory copes with a bit more than that!

[french frank]

Your post was at 2013; surely your memory copes with a bit more than that!

When you reach my age it goes back way before that! It's these recent things I have no memory of.

[Serial_Apologist]

When you reach my age it goes back way before that! It's these recent things I have no memory of.

Seventeen years too late to have made acquaintance with Jane Austen.

[cloughie]

Seventeen years too late to have made acquaintance with Jane Austen.

I think she died more than that time ago - are you sure you’ve been deluded by AI?

[french frank]

I think she died more than that time ago - are you sure you’ve been deluded by AI?

I said I could remember back to c 1834

[cloughie]

I said I could remember back to c 1834

Yes but can S_A?

[smittims]

I'm fortunate in not having needed a Doctor for about six or seven years, so wanting today to make an appointment to discuss something that's come up, I thought I'd be modern and register with 'Patient Access' and do it all on-line. Although I used to use computers the process of attempting to register nearly drove me insane and I had to give up in the end as it became too Kafkaesquely frustrating and infuriating. Screen after screen, security code after security code and then being told it's the wrong one, made me wonder if I'd ever get out. Eventually I was told I'd entered too many and i gave up. Fortunately I live only a 5-minute walk away from the surgery so I'll use the old method. .

How 'non-tech-savvy' people manage goodness knows. The system seems deliberately designed to prevent people from registering, and to make them ill if they weren't already!.

[Pulcinella]

I'm fortunate in not having needed a Doctor for about six or seven years, so wanting today to make an appointment to discuss something that's come up, I thought I'd be modern and register with 'Patient Access' and do it all on-line. Although I used to use computers the process of attempting to register nearly drove me insane and I had to give up in the end as it became too Kafkaesquely frustrating and infuriating. Screen after screen, security code after security code and then being told it's the wrong one, made me wonder if I'd ever get out. Eventually I was told I'd entered too many and i gave up. Fortunately I live only a 5-minute walk away from the surgery so I'll use the old method. .

How 'non-tech-savvy' people manage goodness knows. The system seems deliberately designed to prevent people from registering, and to make them ill if they weren't already!.

Similar situation here, and the reception staff are usually very helpful.
Trying to deal online is a nightmare: partner got into a similar Kafkaesque loop trying to order a repeat prescription but at a lower dose: repeat or review?

[Cockney Sparrow]

My surgery wants patients to go through the e-consult system (seems to be part of the NHS "app"). The list of maladies etc presented didn't cater for my need, but I just chose something vaguely relevant and not alarming and noted the reason in the free text section.

I quite like the system because I can lay out the relevant points and what I'm requesting, and its on record - I received a PDF of it attached to an email. In my opinion that could be more useful than asserting at some later date that I had explained to a receptionist the problem, where potentially I might have been put off. More than once, adding to the written record has led to a sudden change in a situation for the better.

In my case I wanted a fairly routine appointment with a nurse and I gave all my free dates to the end of February. Within 3 hours I got an appointment 6 days later (so 9 Jan), and I hadn't had to go to the surgery, nor listen to the punishing messages on the 'phone line where, whatever the time of day I am held (often number two in the queue) for about 12-15 minutes listening to frequent strident repeat messages about e-consult, NHS 111, etc etc.

It also occurs to me that being persistent, not taking "can't do anything for that" for an answer can lead to being labelled as breaching the rule of reasonable behaviour to the staff member - no matter how temperate one remains. Doing it in writing avoids that.

(I've found a similar situation with companies that record my call- insurance, etc. As it happens my new telephone service (not mobile) records the conversation. In a call where my note of the 'phone call showed the insurance cover was not what I had agreed, the other side suddenly became amenable when I pointed out that not only they, but I, had a recording of the conversation in question.
It also annoys me greatly where a call answerer won't give me a name or employee reference - I point out the inequality, where I have had to go through all the hoops to identify myself, all I know is that I spoke to a man with an accent, or some such at a certain time on the date in question).

[LMcD]

A 92-year-old resident of our local care home was visited by a nurse/health assistant from the local GP surgery and told she needed Vitamin D4.
The care home had to contact the GP surgery, which posted a letter to the resident confirming that she needed Vitamin D4, but added that it doesn't issue a prescription in such cases. Said resident's son then had to be informed, make a special trip into town to buy Vitamin D4 and return to the care home with same.

When it comes to complaints generally, I've found that an old-fashioned 'snail mail' letter produces quicker results and avoids the need to describe the problem to a succession of bots or 'live chat' staff - a process which will, more often than not, take you in a complete circle and ask you to double-verify your bona fides all over again..

[Serial_Apologist]

Fortunately my local surgery let up on their insistence on online communications last year and I found I was able to slip in to make appointments, though the deserted waiting area suggested that few patients know about this, otherwise the place would be as crammed as pre-Covid. In other areas of authentication requirements for logging on I do find myself frequently encountering insoluble obstructions and in some cases having to give up and hope it doesn't matter. The latest being trying to find out the net value of my private pension fund since it was transferred from Scottish Life to Prudential. Since that date I have received no notification to that effect. Now my share portfolio management company wants the figure. I have tried going through the "five minute" registration procedure only to be told I am already registered and that my various access codes are wrong. Having spent hours trawling through records I can find no record of having ever done so. And in any case doesn't seem to be any route to re-newing or changing them, and the phone line is at the user's considerable expense, given daytime working hours only. I can only hope the figure I put in last time (whenever that was after the takeover) will be believed!

[oddoneout]

I'm fortunate in not having needed a Doctor for about six or seven years, so wanting today to make an appointment to discuss something that's come up, I thought I'd be modern and register with 'Patient Access' and do it all on-line. Although I used to use computers the process of attempting to register nearly drove me insane and I had to give up in the end as it became too Kafkaesquely frustrating and infuriating. Screen after screen, security code after security code and then being told it's the wrong one, made me wonder if I'd ever get out. Eventually I was told I'd entered too many and i gave up. Fortunately I live only a 5-minute walk away from the surgery so I'll use the old method. .

How 'non-tech-savvy' people manage goodness knows. The system seems deliberately designed to prevent people from registering, and to make them ill if they weren't already!.

When I wanted to register for the GP online system years ago to have access to my medical records(I needed to check a couple of vaccinations) I had to make a written request, and even then they weren't keen. It was a palaver - printing off a sheet of instructions with a temporary passcode("For security purposes please ensure you memorise these details and destroy this printout" - I didn't and had reason to be glad I had disobeyed on a couple of occasions ) and grappling with a poorly designed registration process. After all that the vaccination details I wanted were not on the record, but the page had been filled with all sorts of vacc details that didn't apply - the vaccines weren't even around at the age I was supposed to have had them! When I asked that the record be corrected I was told they couldn't do that, and neither could they suggest how I could find out about the one that was missing that I wanted the details of and had registered to look up...
Using the online system wasn't easy as the surgery home page didn't have any links to a login - it took a few attempts to find out how to access it, and then I discovered that as the waiting times for appointments were so long I couldn't book an appt with my GP online anyway - the calendar didn't go far enough ahead, and often I couldn't book with another doctor either. Even before Covid the appointment request system kept changing and after Covid the surgery was put in special measures for some time so nothing worked then either. Last time I looked online GP appt booking wasn't available at all. Good thing that I don't need to see a doctor very often at all and that I live 10 minutes walk away from the surgery so can book in person.

[LMcD]

When I wanted to register for the GP online system years ago to have access to my medical records(I needed to check a couple of vaccinations) I had to make a written request, and even then they weren't keen. It was a palaver - printing off a sheet of instructions with a temporary passcode("For security purposes please ensure you memorise these details and destroy this printout" - I didn't and had reason to be glad I had disobeyed on a couple of occasions ) and grappling with a poorly designed registration process. After all that the vaccination details I wanted were not on the record, but the page had been filled with all sorts of vacc details that didn't apply - the vaccines weren't even around at the age I was supposed to have had them! When I asked that the record be corrected I was told they couldn't do that, and neither could they suggest how I could find out about the one that was missing that I wanted the details of and had registered to look up...
Using the online system wasn't easy as the surgery home page didn't have any links to a login - it took a few attempts to find out how to access it, and then I discovered that as the waiting times for appointments were so long I couldn't book an appt with my GP online anyway - the calendar didn't go far enough ahead, and often I couldn't book with another doctor either. Even before Covid the appointment request system kept changing and after Covid the surgery was put in special measures for some time so nothing worked then either. Last time I looked online GP appt booking wasn't available at all. Good thing that I don't need to see a doctor very often at all and that I live 10 minutes walk away from the surgery so can book in person.

When our local hospital asked me why I was contacting them in connection with a recent check-up on a family member, I told them that I was doing so under an LPA. 'Well, we have no record of such an LPA', they said. 'But I registered it with our GP surgery a few weeks ago', I replied. ''I'm sure you did', came the reply, 'but we don't have access to GP surgeries' patient records'

[Dave2002]

When our local hospital asked me why I was contacting them in connection with a recent check-up on a family member, I told them that I was doing so under an LPA. 'Well, we have no record of such an LPA', they said. 'But I registered it with our GP surgery a few weeks ago', I replied. ''I'm sure you did', came the reply, 'but we don't have access to GP surgeries' patient records'

I really can't comment on the most recent situations, but a few years ago we had some issues and went to our local hospital in Epsom for help at A and E. At one point we had a discussion about our records, with a local GP surgery. This prompted a response - oh - you're lucky - we have arrangements with your surgery to share data. It didn't occur to us at the time that the NHS hospital couldn't access relevant data. It seems that some surgeries were linked into a common shared data system, and some weren't. There didn't seem to be any particular logic behind which ones shared data and those that didn't. The communications within the hospital were interesting - and fast - with X-ray images being made almost instantly available [once the images had been taken] to an medical practitioner with access to a connected display screen.

[LMcD]

I thought - rather naively, perhaps - that GP surgeries and hospitals were part of the same health service treating the same patients,