GP Appointments
DR SARTORI SURGERY
DR BENSUSAN SURGERY
All requests for Doctor’s appointments must be made by telephone. We cannot routinely accept walk in patients. If you come to the surgery to book an appointment you must be prepared to leave a phone number and details of the medical problem/query.
For acute care and routine GP appointments we advise to telephone the surgery, our lines are open from 8:00am.
We place additional staff on our telephones at busier times so if you cannot get through immediately it is because we are extremely busy, receptionists endeavour to answer your call as soon as possible. All calls are recorded for staff training and volumes monitored.
To enable safe management of patients the number of appointment slots available each day are limited - our service is not open ended, which means that GP appointments will close early if maximum capacity is reached (when full). Calls received outside this time are dealt with by just one on-call Duty GP (by telephone) – and will be strictly emergencies and urgent medical problems only, therefore you will be asked to ring back the next working day.
Same day appointments will be offered to children under 16 with urgent acute presentations.
Please provide a brief and relevant description of your medical problem/query to the receptionist. This enables the GP to prioritise your treatment and understand your medical problem before they call you/see you.
Based on the information you supply; the receptionist will provide you with the most appropriate appointment or signpost you to the most appropriate service for your needs.
If you need a face to face appointment with a GP, the receptionist will allocate you a time that day, subject to availability.
If your problem can be dealt with over the telephone then the receptionist will take your telephone number. You will be advised when the Doctor will ring you back.
You will be informed that a GP will ring you back either; sometime in the morning or afternoon. Please ensure you are available when the doctor calls. If you are calling on behalf of someone else, please ensure where possible you are with them.
Telephone appointments give patients the opportunity to discuss their ailments sometimes avoiding the need to visit the surgery.
The receptionist may advise another service such as Physio Direct, Minor Injuries Unit, a Dentist, Optician etc if such services meet your needs. For example, a Doctor will not treat dental/oral problems; these are best dealt with by a Dentist who specialises in oral treatment. If you access the GP for a dental problem it may result in a delay in treatment because you may miss an earlier appointment which your dentist had to offer.
By accessing the correct service the first time will save time wasted and will make space for other patients to be seen appropriately with the GP.
There is more information in our Who Should I See? leaflet available on our website or collect one at the practice. These are for you and your family to keep at home to refer to.
Requests for house calls remain unchanged, we ask that where possible a request is made before 11:00am.
Telephone Number to call for routine appointments – 01792 581666
We do not provide emergency prescriptions. If you request a prescription at short notice the receptionist will advise that you cannot collect until 48 hours. We have new strict rules on prescription ordering that our staff must adhere to, to enable enough time for your prescription to be processed. Please be supportive of this.
Test Results can be accessed between 2:00-4.00pm via the surgery line.
Please note: Anyone identified as abusing the system to access an appointment inappropriately will be approached by the GP and the incident reported to management which may result in a warning, or being asked to register at another practice. We take this seriously because patients accessing services inappropriately take up a space from our patients who would genuinely need that appointment.
For follow up GP appointments, you should ring on the day you need to be seen. In some cases the GP may book you in themselves.
Some appointments, e.g. medicals or chronic condition reviews may take longer than 10 minutes usually allocated for a routine appointment/telephone call back. If you think that your appointment might need extra time please tell a member of the team at the time of booking.
Cancellations
If you are unable to keep an appointment then please cancel it. We have a huge demand for our appointments and we ask you to please inform us as soon as possible if you are unable to attend, so that your appointment can be given to someone who needs it.
Training Practice
We are a training practice and continually have GP Registrars with us at the Medical Centre. They are fully qualified doctors who join the practice to complete their specialist training in general practice and have already spent at least 3 years working in hospital. They will often have more time to spend with you. We occasionally ask you if we can video record your consultation as part of the training programme but you do not have to agree.
We also have final year medical students attached to us to learn about general practice and gain experience with patients. We may ask you if you will allow a student to sit in while you are seeing the doctor, or whether you mind a student seeing you before the doctor does. Once again you do not have to agree.