Why are fury over

FRUSTRATED patients told yesterday how they are being made to wait more than a month to see a doctor.

Scores of readers shared their experiences after the Daily Express exposed the crisis caused by a shortage of GPs.

Management consultant John Maynard, 72, of Stockton-on-Tees, claimed he was told that if he tried to cheat the system by saying his illness was an emergency, and it was ruled that he could have waited, he would be penalised in future.

He said: “Prior to February we could make an appointment and see our doctor on the same day and had been able to do so for more than 20 years.

“Since our doctor’s retirement I have had to make two appointments and had to wait five weeks for each of them. Ironically, on both occasions, I was referred to a specialist.

“I have had discussions with the practice manager about the waiting time and was told they would see patients within a few days for an emergency but could not guarantee I would see my own doctor.

“I was also warned that if I insisted on an appointment being an emergency I would be assessed by the doctor and if it was thought I could have waited then I would have difficulties making an appointment in future.”

He added: “I raised the waiting time issue with my new doctor and she said the practice policy was nonemergency appointments would not be seen too quickly because this reduced the number of patients as the complaint or illness went away during the waiting time.

“To this day I do not know what constitutes an emergency for an appointment with my GP and feel policies like the one at my practice are one of the reasons why the hospital A&E departments are under so much pressure.”

Queens Park Medical Centre said that no one was available to respond to Mr Maynard’s claims.

Jeweller David Scott, 68, said he has experienced similar problems at Hawthorn Medical Practice in Skegness, Lincolnshire.

He said: “You are very lucky to wait four weeks to see a doctor. Here you will have to wait six weeks, if you can get an appointment, and even then it won’t be the doctor of your choice.

“I mentor a lady who was a companion of my late father and she is in her 90th year. When she went to the surgery she was told she wouldn’t get an appointment for a week or two.

“When she said she wasn’t leaving, the receptionist went round the back and had a word with the duty doctor who said she would have to see one of the practice nurses.

“I think they work hard enough but there just seems too few of them. It all seems a bit uncaring.” The surgery Prof Stokes-Lampard: Not enough GPs said it offered patients the ability to pre-book appointments up to four weeks in advance and encouraged patients to contact them directly if they had complaints.

An 83-year-old reader from Buckinghamshire said: “Normally it is a five-week wait for an appointment here. I said to the receptionist, ‘Why don’t you get more doctors?’ and she said, ‘To get more doctors you have to get more patients’. It doesn’t seem to make any sense to me.”

Barry Day, 71, of Frodsham, Cheshire, said: “I contacted my surgery on June 6 to make an appointment to see a GP – any GP. I was given a date of June 30. It’s outrageous to have to wait that length of time, particularly when your symptoms are worrying you.”

Kathleen Stone, of Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, said: “It’s not unusual to have to wait over four weeks to see your doctor. I have two friends who have the same GP and recently they both had to wait over four weeks to see him.

“At one stage I counted 22 GPs’ brass plates on the board. Now we are down to 14-16 GPs.”

Another reader said: “The last appointment was a three-week wait. When my skin turned yellow I managed to get an emergency appointment a week sooner. Blood tests were taken and that day I was admitted to hospital with dangerously high bilirubin levels.”

The Government has promised 5,000 extra GPs by 2020 but the Royal College of General Practioners says more than 6,000 are needed now.

Chairwoman Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard said: “We share our patients’ frustration as they wait longer for a GP appointment but unfortunately it is a direct result of not enough doctors and not enough funding to meet demand that is escalating in both volume and complexity.” Yesterday’s Daily Express front page