Appointments

Please help our Receptionists to help you!

In order to help us to always make best use of our services we would ask all our patients to please note the following:

Consultations with our doctors and nurses are by pre-booked appointment only and are usually for 10 minutes. Some tests, consultations or procedures may require longer than 10 minutes, so please give our reception staff as much information as you can when you telephone for an appointment. Our receptionists are instructed to ask you the reason for the appointment in order that we can direct you to the most appropriate clinician.

Always report to Reception on your arrival at the Medical Practice so that the doctor or nurse can be made aware of your arrival.

Important! Please LET US KNOW IF YOU CANNOT ATTEND for your appointment, so it can be released for use by someone else. Many hours of doctor and nurse time is wasted each week by people not telephoning to cancel an appointment.

Bookable On the Day Appointments

Each day we have some appointments that are only ‘ bookable on the day’ i.e they are only released for use to the Reception staff ‘on the day’ at 8am. These are held for patients who have a real need to see a doctor the same day – please respect the conditions attached to these appointments.

Commuter Appointments

There are also 'Commuter Appointments' available between 8am and 8:30am and after 6pm on some weekdays, in order to assist patients who commute some distance to work. Please ask for day time surgery appointments if you do NOT work and let our reception staff know if you are a commuter.

Form Completion - Insurance etc

Inform the receptionist if you require a medical or completion of an insurance report. These appointments can require more than 10 minutes and we are entitled to charge a fee for these services, as they are not part of NHS activity. All fees must be paid to Reception before leaving the surgery.

Please make a separate appointment for each member of the family who has to be seen, so that other patients are not kept waiting.  

Please be patient if you are kept waiting past your allocated appointment time. Some patient consultations take longer than expected. Also the doctors can be called to attend an emergency in the Hospital, the Casualty Suite or a local traffic accident. Our reception staff will always keep you informed of the reasons behind any delay.  

Home Visits

All requests for Home Visits before 10am, please.

A doctor or nurse may phone you back as it may be that your problem can be dealt with by telephone advice, or that it would be more appropriate to send a nurse, or indeed arrange a hospital attendance.

House visits are only available for patients who are housebound because of illness or disability.

Please remember that several patients can be seen in the practice in the time that it takes to make one home visit. There are also better facilities for examining and treating patients at the Health Centre.

Telephone Consultations

Telephone consultations are available between 9:00 am and 9:30 am.