Appointments

Appointment system

Due to changes in the GP contract from 15th May 2023, the way practices deal with patients when they contact the surgery for an appointment has changed. In the past, practices may have sometimes asked patients to call back the following day once all of their appointments that day were fully booked. This is no longer an appropriate response, and instead the patient should be offered one of the below options:

• Invite the patient for a face to face/telephone/video appointment.
• Provide appropriate advice or care to the patient by another method.
• Invite the patient to make use of or direct the patient towards appropriate services which are available to the patient, including services which the patient may access themselves such as pharmacies and self-referrals.
• Communicate with the patient to request further information, or to convey when and how the patient will receive further information on the services that may be provided to them, having regard to the urgency of their clinical needs and other relevant circumstances.

Colliery Court Medical Group aim to offer patients an appointment with an appropriate clinician on first contact with the practice where appropriate.

The appointment system was changed in May 2023 to both meet the new contract requirements and ensure GPs were seeing a safe number of patients. BMA guidance currently states 25-35 patient contacts per day as a safe number.

The appointment system now running is as follows:

• Every day there is an on-call GP. That GP runs a triage list with 35 patient contacts. This is a mix of econsults, home visits and patients who cannot wait to be seen at the next routine appointment. In addition to this they process urgent prescription requests, deal with urgent queries from other healthcare professionals and see patients face to face from the triage list who need an examination.
• Once the on-call GP triage list is full, the reception team will sign post any patients who need urgent assessment which cannot wait until the next routine appointment with a GP or Advanced Nurse Practitioner (ANP) to 111.
• If the on-call GP has any blocks on their triage list to attend a meeting or for GP Registrar training debriefs, the same number of appointments will be blocked and open on the day with another GP or ANP, so there are always 35 on the day appointments.
• All other appointments with the GPs, ANPs and Nursing team are pre-bookable up to 4 weeks in advance.
• A couple of slots are held back each day for the team to book reviews requested by the GP or ANP.
• Most appointments show as face to face on the clinical system but can be switched to telephone or video calls at the patient’s request.
• Appointments can also be booked in Extended Access clinics at local surgeries. These clinics run outside of normal opening hours on mornings, evenings and weekends. Patients will travel to a local surgery to be seen be the appropriate clinician for their issue. All appointments are pre-bookable up to 2 weeks in advance.
• There may be less than 4 weeks advance booking of appointments if there are staff on leave or if we are awaiting GPR rotas to be released. Reception staff can advise patients if this is the case and offer appointments in the Extended Access clinics.

All patients are asked about their symptoms when they call the practice. This is to ensure they are booked an appointment with the correct clinician:

• Patients calling with foot problems will be booked in with the podiatrist.
• Mental health problems will be booked in with the Mental Health Practitioner and offered the Crisis Team number.
• Patients with joint pain and back ache will be booked in with the physiotherapists.
• Patients with any type of chest pain will be sign posted to A&E.
• Minor ailments will be referred to the pharmacy using the Community Pharmacy Consultation Service (CPCS)
• A lot of patients will be suitable for the ANP leaving the GP available for more complex patients.
• Sick note requests can be submitted via the practice website which are passed on to the GP.

Colliery Court Medical Group continue to work with the Patient Reference Group and listen to patient feedback to ensure good access to care is maintained.

SMS Texts and Emails