Right to Respond

As part of our commitment to providing an honest and transparent view of health and social care services, Healthwatch Birmingham encourages providers to respond to comments the public have left.

Alongside ensuring providers can have a fair say in discussions about their services, replying to reviews demonstrates evidence of responding to patient feedback for the CQC, who regularly monitor our Feedback Centre. It is also an effective way to recruit service users for any wider engagement work at your organisation.

Guidelines for provider responses:

  • Keep language appropriate and civil
  • Remain professional and treat people’s comments fairly
  • Engage with the content of the review by addressing specific points and avoid cut and pasting a standard response
  • Don’t disclose the service user’s personal details or any potentially identifying information
  • Where appropriate leave organisational contact details e.g PALS or patient engagement teams for people to get further information

Remember: your response will be seen by everyone who uses the Feedback Centre, not just the original reviewer. All responses are moderated in accordance with our moderation policy.

For full terms and conditions, including a guide to how right to reply works for service providers download this guide.

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Original feedback for

The Vesey Practice


Almost impossible to get an appointment

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.