APPOINTMENTS

We offer a range of different appointments to cater for all of our patients. When you call the surgery to make an appointment, our receptionists will ask you to give them a brief outline of the reason for your appointment in order to enable them to direct you to the most appropriate clinician. They are not being ‘nosey’ – they are simply trying to ensure you are seen as quickly as possible by the most appropriate person and are working to guidelines and protocols specified by the GPs. We greatly appreciate your help with this and ask for your continued support to enable the most efficient use of our resources. For further information, please refer to our 'How can we help' leaflet.

We do of course understand and are respectful of the cases where you may not feel able to discuss your problem with the receptionist.

You can book an appointment by calling the surgery on 01995 607399, via Patient Access or the myGP app.

TYPES OF APPOINTMENTS

Calder Suite Appointments:

A team of nurse practitioners and GP’s continue to work in our newly refurbished annex to provide on the day care for new episodes of illness. This includes problems such as dermatology, musculo-skeletal (including back pain), gynaecology, ENT, chest infections, abdominal pain. Please give the receptionist as much information as possible to ensure you are booked an appropriate appointment. Please telephone before 11.00 am for a Calder Suite appointment.

Same Day GP Appointments:

These appointments are available to be booked on the day for either new episodes of care that are not suitable to be seen in the Calder Suite or that require ongoing follow up from a GP. These will be available with each GP working that day. You will be able to request the doctor of your choice for a Same Day GP appointment and we will accommodate this as far as possible, although obviously once a doctor is fully booked you may need to ring back another day or see a different doctor.

Urgent Problems:

For problems that require possible urgent same day attention, hospital admission or emergency referral please let the receptionist know so that we can ensure you are seen or given appropriate clinical advice that day.

Routine Appointments:

Routine appointments are available to pre-book up to four weeks in advance. 8.15am appointments are available on a Friday morning for patients who work. Late appointments are also available on a Monday for patients who work and find it difficult to come during normal working hours.

Telephone Options:

We have telephone appointments available on the same day for minor ailments that our clinical pharmacists are able to manage and a number of telephone slots available with the GPs throughout the week for simple queries such as test results. If you feel that your current problem could be dealt with over the phone please inform the receptionist.

Visits:

Patients who require a home visit will be contacted by one of the clinicians to arrange this. Not all visits need to be done on the day of the request and it will help the doctors to spread these out over the working week where appropriate. Currently we can get up to 20 visit requests on a Monday but we may only get 6 mid-week. Please contact reception before 10.00 am in the usual way to request a visit and a doctor or nurse will ring you back to discuss this.

Appointment Reminders

We send appointment reminders via text message to those who have mobile numbers on their record. We also utilise the text message service for the Family and Friends test but you will not receive a request for feedback more than once in a 90If y day period.

Cancelling Appointments

If you no longer require your appointment, we respectfully request that you cancel it as far in advance as possible so the appointment can be provided to another patient. You can cancel your appointments via Patient Access or the myGP app, by responding 'cancel' to a text reminder, or by calling reception on 01995 607399.