The Vesey Practice

Accepting no appointments at all, 111 are even being told to not contact them! It couldn’t really be worse. There is no GP surgery.

Frustrating trying to get through as phones are always busy. Not their fault. Just have to be patient. I've found the receptionists really helpful when I have got through. They are understaffed and a lot are suffering stress due to abusive people. They are doing their best.

The practice has made it as difficult as possible to book an appointment.

My brother had heart failure and a stroke in 2017 and since then has been disabled with limited feeling on his left side. About 6 weeks ago he started complaining about constipation and was vomiting up anything he ate and drank. He also said he felt bloated. We called the surgery and he had several telephone consultations with different laxatives being prescribed. 3 weeks ago he was referred for a colonoscopy in august. I wasn’t happy with waiting that long especially as he was feeling severe pain and bloating in his left lower abdomen which he’d reported to the doctor. I took him to A&E and he was admitted and 2 days later had a bowel resection and now has a stoma bag. The growth in his bowel is currently being analysed. He is still in hospital on fluids. I think that if he had actually been physically seen by a doctor they would have checked his stomach and have he would have been treated sooner. Disappointed that no account was taken of his lack of feeling on his left side when reviewing how much pain he was in

My biggest concern is the telephone. You are now on a group of GPS and you can be waiting on the phone for over an hour in a cue . No 46 ....then when and if you get through (and there are times you are "next in line" it just rings and rings and is never answered) you end up speaking to someone who just types up what you say and emails it to the practice. This then doesn't get actioned when its time sensitive!!! Ends up being a complete waste of time as you end up having to ring yet again to ask why it hasn't been actioned. If you are ill you would be so frustrated. Most of the time it is a simple thing you need but you have to psyc yourself up to make the call

Too much red tape to get a face to face appointment with a doctor

Almost impossible to get an appointment. If you are lucky enough to get someone to answer the phone, you have to explain your problem to a receptionist. I assume this person has no medical training. She then decides if you are worthy of an appointment and whether it is with a nurse or a doctor. This system relies on a medically unqualified person making crucial decisions. Each patient apparently has a named GP, but there is never an option to see them or speak to them. So the named GP is pretty pointless. The whole appointment system assumes patients are free at 08.00 in order to dedicate an hour to repeat phoning in attempts to get through to the practice, then waiting in a phone queue listening to inane music if you do manage get through, then describing symptoms to aforementioned unqualified receptionist, then waiting by the telephone for a doctor/nurse to call you back at a vaguely specified time. It just doesn’t work for anyone who is trying to work at the same time. You have to take a whole day off work to dedicate to trying to get an appointment.

Poor since moving to phone consultations. I have had two occasions to contact the doctors and both have been dealt with initially by a nurse. Both resulted in being prescribed medication which did not resolve the issue and which needed multiple follow up calls. In the first case a urine sample which showed that the course of medication prescribed was not suitable was ignored and it was only on me following contacting them again as I was not getting better that a GP changed the prescription. The second occasion was for a skin condition, the prescription made things worse and I have given up on the prescribed treatment. Skin conditions need someone to look at them, not guess from a description over the phone. I am really disappointed with the service and hope I don’t get ill anytime soon.
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Since 2018 when it became part of a 7 group practice access to appointments has got worse weekly even taking covid out of the picture You can no longer book appointments online or do telephone requests for repeat prescriptions It has taken up to two weeks of trying to actually get to speak to a GP A GP asked me to email some information and when I did I got an abrupt email back saying book an appointment which took another week to do This is not acceptable I have had incorrect referrals done I have been put on less good medication so they could avoid doing tests in the surgery Not good enough at all
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It is almost impossible to get through at 8am to book an appointment to see a doctor. After weeks of trying, I got through today but it took 45 mins before I could speak to a person. It felt as if it had to be a real emergency before I could see my GP. Thankfully it was and I was booked in for a telephone consultation. The timeline was anytime after 12 and before 2pm!! I had to get my daughter from school so that she could be there although the dr didn’t even need to speak to her, just asked about her condition and asked to see her face to face for the next day, which is great but it means a morning off school now. I cannot fault the GP as he was amazing but I am very dissatisfied with the appointment system.
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