Routine Appointments with a Doctor
We offer a wide range of appointments that can be either pre-booked or booked on the day. Pre booking routine appointments will ensure that you see the Doctor of your choice on the day that you want; this also gives better continuity of care.
We cannot guarantee that you can see the doctor of your choice if you ring on the day. However we will try to accommodate where possible. Please remember that we only have a limited amount of appointments that we can offer on the day and once they are gone they are gone.
If and when you require an appointment, please phone the surgery on 01254 915823 – and select option 1 for appointments. You can book for the Barbara Castle Way site and the Mellor branch surgery on this number.
Pre-Booking an appointment from 8.30am
You can make your appointment:-
- By Telephone (01254 915823 Option 1)
- Using the On-line services to book on-line
To book on-line you need to be registered for this service. To do this please see registering for on-line services.
Routine appointments can also be booked in advance for a future day for convenience. We try to accommodate you with the doctor of your choice. Obviously, this is the GP who is more familiar with your medical history, especially if you have on going or complex problems.
If your doctor of choice is not available in a time span deemed inappropriate by you then we will offer you an appointment with another doctor. Remember, your doctor of choice may be on leave either study or holiday, or booked up well in advance.
Cancelling Appointments
If you find that your appointment is no longer required, or an unforeseen circumstance prevents you keeping your appointment, you must cancel it otherwise the appointment slot is wasted. You can cancel by ringing the surgery as soon as possible after your decision to cancel, or if you have booked on-line you can also cancel on-line.
Urgent Appointments
For an acute problem that needs an appointment on the same day please ring 01254 915823 from 8.00am and select option 1. You will be asked some questions by the reception team and offered an appointment with the Duty Doctor of the day starting from 08.30am.
Regular appointments are opened at 08.30am for all available GP’s. Once these are fully booked – any further requests for urgent/ acute problems will then be added to the Duty Doctors telephone triage list. The Duty doctor of the day will make contact over the phone, they will then make a clinical decision if you need to be seen. All appointments for the duty Doctor are at the Barbara Castle Way site.
Urgent problems will be seen on the same day, but not necessarily by your usual doctor. Please tell the receptionist if you feel that your problem is urgent. Sick children will always be seen on the same day (bringing them to the surgery may be quicker than a visit)
Home Visits
Home visits are available for those who are unable to come to the surgery for medical reasons e.g. if you are bedbound. As the quality of care we can provide at the Health Centre is far in excess of what we can provide in patient’s homes, we would normally only recommend a home visit as a last resort.
If you require a visit please ring the usual surgery number (01254 915823 option 1).
Please try to request home visits before 10.00am if possible, as this helps the doctors to organise their day in order to give you a better service. Explaining the symptoms, if at all possible, to the receptionist will also help the doctor to see the most urgent cases first.
Telephone Consultations with a Doctor
If you would like to speak to a doctor and it is not a medical emergency please ring the surgery (01254 915823 option 1) and the receptionist will book a telephone consultation with the Doctor of your Choice. This may not be on the day you ring the practice as a our doctors are not available on every day of the week.
For non-urgent matters please avoid telephoning during our busiest times, which is before 10.00am, especially on a Monday. Your call is likely to be dealt with quicker if you follow these guidelines.
Late Policy
Patients are expected to arrive in good time for their appointments. If patients arrive more than 5 minutes late, they have missed their appointment and will need to rebook. This is to prevent delays to the GP sessions and to ensure fairness for patients who have arrived on time.
We appreciate the effort our patients make to attend on time and therefore do our best to run as close to booked appointment times as possible. Adhering to a Late Patient Policy assists us in doing so. However, due to the nature of a GP surgery, sometimes the doctor or nurse may be running behind. When the clinician is running late our reception staff will advise the patients upon arrival and apologise to them for the delay.
- If you arrive 5mins late or more after your GP appointment time – you have missed your appointment, you will not be seen. You will have to rebook for the next available pre-bookable appointment or phone the next day from 08.30am to request a book on the day appointment.
- If you arrive 5mins late or more for a Nurse or Health Care Assistant appointment you will not be seen and will have to rebook.
- Please don’t embarrass the reception staff by asking to be seen if you have been informed to rebook. This policy is devised by the GP Partners and the reception staff are to abide by their policy.
If a patient calls ahead to say they will be late, this does not alter the policy. If they are going to be late, the receptionist will advise them on the phone that they should rebook, rather than waste a journey.
Reception staff are not permitted to interrupt doctors during surgery to request them to see late patients, so to avoid disappointment, please do not ask them to do so.
