March 2023 Newsletter
As we move on from the pandemic we felt this was a good time to get in touch with you to keep you up to date with developments within the practice and more widely within the NHS.
Firstly we want to say a big thank you to our patients for your understanding during the pandemic. It was a very challenging time for us all and we appreciate your patience and support. You will know from the media that the NHS is struggling to manage the backlogs that have been created by the pandemic and we are doing our best to adapt to these new pressures. The significant increase in outpatient waiting times impacts on our workload as we do our best to support patients whilst they wait for more specialised treatment, as well as dealing with unmet needs that accumulated during the pandemic.
PRACTICE LIST SIZE
The practice itself has continued to grow and our practice is now over 10,600 patients which has been a significant increase in the last few years.
We are sometimes asked why we continue to accept new patients. We maintain an open list as this is in line with health board policy which dictates that practices should only close their lists in extreme circumstances.
CHANGES TO STAFFING
We appointed a new GP partner in October 2022, Dr. Matthew McHardy and a salaried GP in October 2021, Dr. Precious Osadolor. Both have been a great asset to the Practice. Our admin team has also seen a few changes over the year. All our new staff members share our practice ethos and we are very fortunate to have them.
APPOINTMENTS
During and since the pandemic we have tried different patterns of appointments and we are planning to try another change which we hope will bring the right balance of continuity and accessibility. Currently we are offering pre-bookable face to face appointments, these can be a telephone consultation on request. In addition to this more urgent requests will be triaged by GP in the first instance to determine the best course of action.
PRE-BOOKABLE APPOINTMENTS
There will be a good number of pre-bookable appointments to allow more patients to book with a doctor or on a day of their choice if the concerns are not urgent.
SAME DAY APPOINTMENTS
If you have a problem which needs to be dealt with more urgently, all relevant details will be taken and passed to GP for triage. You will then be contacted by GP or an admin team member. You will then be offered telephone advice, an on the day appointment or an appointment within a suitable timescale. For these appointments you won’t be able to specify a particular doctor and will be dealt with by whoever is available on that day.
NURSE APPOINTMENTS
Nurse appointments are available by booking via the telephone or at reception and include the following:
Blood Pressure Monitoring
Emergency Dressings and Stitch Removal
Blood Tests (including monitoring for certain medications)
Cervical Smear Screening
Depo-provera and Denosumab Injections
Ear assessment – Ear irrigations can be arranged via 0141 304 7408
The following services are carried out by our nursing colleagues at Community Treatment and Care Clinic (CTAC) at Kirkintilloch Health Care Centre – 0141 304 7408:
Dressings
Wound checks
Stitches
Ear wax removal
Injections (except Depo-provera and Denosumab injections)
PRESCRIPTIONS
As a practice we process about 700 prescriptions a week. This is a significant part of the practice workload and currently is not evenly distributed through the working week, with the majority of the prescription requests coming to us in the early part of the week. Can we ask that you give at least 72 hours for processing of prescriptions to allow us to spread this work more evenly over the working week. Ideally you would order prescriptions a week in advance. Last minute medication requests when patients are running out of medication takes up GP time and stops other tasks being attended to. Please also be aware that your regular pharmacy is allowed to provide emergency supplies of regular medication.
Please note we have a separate 24/7 answering machine for all prescription requests available on 0141 776 1515. Prescriptions can also be ordered online (please see website for details)
TRAINING PRACTICE
We are a registered GP Training site. GP training involves working in hospitals and GP surgeries for 3 years. These qualified Doctors work under close supervision but also have areas of expertise from their previous experience in hospitals. They will on occasions seek patient consent for video recordings which are used strictly for teaching and training purposes. All data is held securely and in line with current GDPR guidance. They work alongside a supervisor or mentor who is an experienced GP within the practice. We hope you will support these young doctors as they progress towards becoming independent GPs.
VACCINATIONS
Vaccinations are no longer being delivered by the GP practice but have been centralised. Many of you will have had experience of attending central vaccination clinics for your flu and Covid vaccinations in the last year or two. This will now include shingles, pneumococcal, pertussis vaccines and if you are eligible for these vaccines you will receive a letter inviting you. From 1st April 2022 the way you receive your vaccinations for overseas travel has changed. This means that you will no longer receive these from your GP surgery, instead you can book your vaccination via the following outlet. The changes are for both adult and childhood travel vaccinations. It is important to make this Initial appointment as early as possible.
In NHSGGC, you will be able to receive your vaccination by contacting the following provider:
Email: [email protected]
Call: 0141 673 3003
All information is on our website.
TEXT MESSAGE COMMUNICATION
Where possible we are trying to communicate with patients via text message to help reduce the cost of postage and to allow us to communicate quicker with patients. If you do have a mobile number please ask the receptionist to add it to your records. Please remember to inform the practice if you change your number.
SUPPORT FOR PRIMARY CARE
In 2018 a primary care improvement plan was proposed by the health board and the plan was to have GPs supported by phlebotomy teams, in practice physiotherapy, pharmacy support and community links workers. To date we have received some of the support from this plan. We are hopeful that more will become available for our patients in the years ahead.
Currently we have 2 pharmacists and a pharmacy technician appointed to the Practice 4 days a week. The pharmacy team help with prescription requests from hospital outpatient clinics and we also get some support with changes to prescriptions when patients have been discharged from hospital.
We also have an Advance Nurse Practitioner (ANP) appointed to the practice. She provides additional consultations one day per week for minor ailments.
We also get support with blood testing from the Community Treatment and Care team.
PLEASE BE KIND TO OUR STAFF
Our GPs, nurses and support staff are working harder than ever. We believe that patients have a right to be heard, understood and respected and we understand the stress of being worried about a health problem. All our staff go above and beyond to care for our patients and they should be able to come to their work without fear of abuse, harassment or violence. We work hard to be open and accessible to everyone and most of our patients are very appreciative. In a small number of cases the actions of individuals are unacceptable because they involve abuse of our staff. When this happens we have to take action to protect our staff and enable the work of the practice to carry on and provide a service to the other patients who need us. We will take action if patients behave in this manner which may lead to them being removed from our practice list.
PRIVATE WORK
As a practice we are committed to the NHS and we want our focus to be entirely on our NHS responsibilities and the clinical care of patients. However we are asked to do many tasks that are not NHS duties and historically have often undertaken these requests without making a charge. We are now moving in line with national practice and will be charging for these types of requests. The private services will be outlined on our practice website. Examples of non-NHS work would include Private medical insurance reports, Holiday cancellation forms, Firearm certificates, Letters requested by or on behalf of patients.
We hope you have found this newsletter useful and informative. We wish you all the best of health but be assured we will be there for you when you do need us.
All at the Regent Gardens Medical Centre