Chislehurst Medical Practice Patient Participation Group (PPG

Number 3 —Autumn 2014
Chislehurst Medical
Practice
Patient Participation Group (PPG) Newsletter
QUESTIONNAIRE
CARERS
So far we have
identified more than
250 carers which have
been added to the
practice’s carer’s
register. The practice
are available to give
advise to carers so
please do not hesitate
to ask them. If you are
a carer and would like
to be registered as
such, you can contact
us or complete the
form at the Surgery.
Currently, we are
setting up a support
group for Carers. We
expect to have more
information on this
before the end of the
year.
We have produced a new
Questionnaire and should
be grateful if you would
complete it for us so that
we can see what concerns
you may have or ideas for
improvement to the service
provided by the Practice.
There is also a Suggestion
Box located in the
entrance lobby of the
surgery.
NEW MEMBERS
We would still welcome a
few more members to our
Group, either to attend
meetings or to be virtual
members communicating
by email. Most of us are
‘of a certain age’ so it
would be particularly good
to have the views of
younger people. Our work
so far has been interesting
and varied. As you will
see, this is our third
Newsletter and
Questionnaire.
CONTACT US
You can contact us by post, addressed to PPG at
Chislehurst Medical Practice. Please leave your note
at Reception for us to collect or you can email us at
[email protected]. Please include your
first and last name and add ‘PPG Registration’ as the
subject. We should like to have your email address on
file. It will be used ONLY for PPG matters and NOT by
the Practice for medical matters. We will use this for us
to send our newsletter and other important
information
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The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
HEALTHY LIVING
We successfully set up a walking group last year
and this continues to prosper. Numbers are
growing and everyone says the walks are really
enjoyable. Having a cup of coffee together
afterwards is an option enjoyed by many of the
walkers. If you would like to join us for a walk, you
just have to be outside the Surgery by 10am on a
Monday morning.
OTHER LOCAL PPGS
We are continuing to contact other Patient
Participation Groups in the area so that we can
perhaps help each other and also act as a larger
body to improve medical services in the
Borough.
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The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
BROMLEY CLINICAL COMMISSIONING GROUP
(CCG)
Dr Parson, who is Chairman of the Bromley CCG, has supplied the following
information:
Bromley CCG hold regular public meetings. These are important for Bromley
residents to attend to be able to have a say in development of healthcare
services. Meetings will include information as follows:
Using patient information in Bromley
Improving care for people with long term conditions
Helping people to manage their medicines
Involving local people in their plans
MISSED
APPOINTMENTS
CO-OPERATION
The Practice co-operate with the PPG
to help provide the best service as
well as care for patients. They have
responded to your requests which
have included hooks!
In order to make life easier, coat and
bag hooks have now been put up in
the toilets and a hook to tether dogs
has been installed just outside the
Surgery entrance.
Whilst on the subject of such work –
we are seeking a volunteer handyman
for the Practice. So an offer of help in
this direction would be appreciated.
As patients we should do our best to
co-operate and, on a more serious
note, having made an appointment to
see a clinician, we really should turn
up for it.
July =163
August = 145
This is really bad! If we are unable to
be at the Surgery at the time and date
made, we should ‘phone as soon as
possible so that our appointment can
be cancelled and another patient
seen. Even if it’s a last minute illness
or emergency of some kind. We have
a dedicated cancellation line so that
you can leave a message with your
appointment details.
It is also very important to arrive at
least 5 minutes prior to your
appointment time to allow for time to
check in when the practice is busy.
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The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
“THE GOOD AND
BAD POINTS
ABOUT THE NHS”
By ROGER W.
LAWSON
As a kidney transplant patient of
16 years standing I have an
extensive medical history, and
lots of experience of using NHS
services. For example, I have
had spells in Guys Hospital,
Princess Royal Hospital
Farnborough, Kings College
Hospital and St. Thomas'
Hospital in the last 20 years,
several trips to A&E and of
course regular visits to the
Chislehurst Medical practice
where Dr. Rub is my G.P and
has been for many years. So this
article is my view on the good
and bad aspects of the NHS, and
how it has improved over the
years.
It's worth stating to begin with
that the beauty of the NHS is that
it is free at the point of delivery
and that it is based on clinical
need, not ability to pay. Those
were two of the founding
principles of the NHS. Of course
we do pay for it indirectly, via our
taxes, but for those with major
life-threatening diseases like
myself it provides an
incomparable service in terms of
access to major specialists,
expensive drugs and necessary
treatments. I certainly have had
few complaints about the level of
care I have received over the
years for my kidney problems
(most transplant patients spend a
few days a year in hospital with
related complaints and I am no
different, because of a
susceptibility to infections and
other issues).
Where the system is not so good
is in dealing with minor
complaints and non-critical
conditions. So there can be long
waiting lists for routine operations, and A&E units consistently
fail to meet their waiting time targets. Even G.P services are now
commonly reported as
"overstretched" although I have
no complaints in that regard. But
obviously a lot of people now turn
up at A&E with minor complaints
because they cannot find another
option, particularly outside
normal office hours. Although
this practice manages their
access so that patients of
Chislehurst do not have to use
the A&E or Urgent Care service
to access primary care services
to the same extent.
In essence the whole NHS
service is under-funded and
therefore there is rationing in
effect (not necessarily very
implicitly but when there is more
demand on resources than
funding to provide them,
obviously some things get
delayed, pushed aside, made
difficult to access or otherwise
finessed out of existence. When I
say it is under-funded, I mean
that as a country we spend less
per head of population on
healthcare than many western
countries (Wikipedia can provide
you with the breakdown if you
want the figures). The big
problem is that NHS spending
comes out of Government
budgets and general taxation. So
although the Government
regularly promises to "ring-fence"
such expenditure from budget
cuts, it is still in essence based
on political decisions and the
health of the economy rather
than that of patients.
My particular concerns in the
past have not been so much on
the medical care at the point of
delivery but on the inefficient
administrative systems backing
that up in the NHS. So it's not so
much the staff who do not try
their best (albeit that some are
lowly paid), but the supporting
systems are not always there. So
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paper based records are only
now being phased out, when
most
commercial organisations changed over twenty years
ago. But
communication
between hospital consultants and
G.Ps seems archaic, and from
patient to doctor or vice versa is
likewise. Even hospital to
hospital communication seems to
be difficult so if you end up in a
hospital other than your main
care point, they will only have
access to basic information for
some time. Apart from the
Government wasting about
£12bn on an ill conceived
"big
-bang" IT system which proved to
be an almost total failure, the
pace of change is still slow because the NHS seems in essence to be an enormous
bureaucracy where the rate of
change is still slow. However I
understand that complex
confidentiality issues have made
this difficult.
For example why cannot we
send an electronic
communication to our G.P.s
rather than sending letters or
turning up in person? I was also
astonished to learn recently that
Chislehurst Medical Practice
G.P.s still dictate some letters
and have secretaries type them
up - a practice that disappeared
from the commercial world many
years ago. Providing IT systems
is one thing of course, but when
there if there is some reluctance
to change the method of working,
then it takes time.
The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
Cont.. But some things have
improved. For example, I have
repeat
prescriptions for several drugs and I can now request
them over the internet and have
them delivered directly to my
home.
I can also pick up my regular
blood test results from the
internet a couple of days after a
sample being taken using a
service called Renal Patient View
(that's better than waiting some
weeks for the next check-up
appointment - although some
patients may not want to see the
results it can help to know what
they are).
Appointment systems have also
improved over the years in most
NHS hospitals (and of course in
our own GP practice).
Even the food in hospitals seems
to have got somewhat better over
the years (I recommend Kings
College Hospital based on my
stays), but can still be somewhat
boring in some.
Medical care tends to take
priority over other things, so
comfort in hospital is still poor
WARFARIN
PATIENTS
Ray, who is a member of our
PPG, thinks there is improved
service in this area. He is a
warfarin patient and he has
written this light-hearted article:
This short note relates to patients
who are prescribed warfarin. Like
most things in life there is some
bad news and good news. So
let’s get the bad news out of the
way first.
As most people know warfarin
controls the thickness of the
blood. I am told that ideally it
should be the correct
consistency. If it’s too thick the
heart has to work harder to push
it through the veins and if too thin
it takes longer to stop any
with Guys still having traditional
"Nightingale" wards - now at least
separated into male and female
when they did not used to be,
and Farnborough hospital is
cramped on the wards and often
hot despite it being relatively
new. Getting a good nights sleep
in an open ward is often not
easy! Likewise parking at
hospitals is a perennial problem,
with inadequate capacity and
high charges. So for example a
new renal clinic and dialysis
unit was opened a couple of
years ago in Tunbridge Wells. It's
very near the centre of town and
has totally inadequate parking
capacity and very restricted
public parking nearby.
Here's a few personal opinions
on how things might be
improved, which will no doubt
generate a lot of debate. The
very monolithic and monopolistic
structure of the NHS provides a
safety net for everyone. But it
results in the average standard of
care and quality of service (in the
wider sense to patients) being
bleeding. So how is it kept at
the right consistency? That’s
fairly easy to explain, the answer
is by regular monitoring.
Until recently monitoring meant
having a blood test which for me,
was normally a trip to the PRUH
Hospital where, if staff were busy
the time to be seen could
anything between one and two
hours. I am not sure whether it
was just me but it always
seemed that at least one
person in the waiting room had a
bad cough or a germ laden
sneeze. Being a nervous sort of
chap I always tried to sit as far
as possible away from any germy
“cougher” or” sneezer”.
Unfortunately any new cougher/
sneezer arriving in the waiting
room always seemed to make a
bee line to my “safe” area and sit
Page 5
low, particularly for less serious
or less glamorous medical
complaints however dedicated
are the staff. Introducing some
more competitive processes into
the NHS along the lines we have
seen recently may help. But I
would prefer a more
revolutionary approach. However
as the NHS is now a political
"sacred cow" of the first order,
any attempt to change it is met
with derision and no politician will
now even talk about "reforming
the NHS". This is a great pity.
Change can be positive as well
as negative and there are lots of
things wrong with the NHS in
detail if you look at it first hand
and have to experience its
shortcomings as a patient.
near me. There was no escape!
Added to this concern and just to
prove that I am a proper wimp I
don't like anyone sticking needles
in me. Nor do I like watching my
blood pouring into one of those
small bottles. I ‘d rather swim
with crocodiles. I couldn’t wait to
get out the Hospital front door,
take a few deep sniffs of fresh air
then move smartly down the
slope into the car park and home,
for a rest.
Within a day or two a letter would
arrive informing me whether I
had to increase or decrease the
warfarin dose.
But the good news. I now go to
Boots Pharmacy. I have a fixed,
(mutually agreed), appointment
and sit in a small room with the
pharmacist who pricks a finger
The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
Cont.. and takes a drip of blood which he or she
places onto a small white card. (Yes, I can watch
that procedure without making a fuss and often
discus my itchy athletes foot – normally the left one
with the pharmacist). The card is put into a small
machine, (about the size of those used by
supermarkets when we use a credit card), and within
a few seconds the result is on the screen and I am
informed whether the dosage requires altering.
It is so nice not having to worry about coughs and
sneezes. So far I’ve never been kept waiting. Every
appointment has been on time. Even in one of my
more grumpy moods I haven’t found anything (yet),
to moan about.
Well done Bromley CCG, The system is a great
improvement.
NEWS FROM THE PRACTICE
FLU VACCINATIONS
Flu vaccinations will be available for all eligible patients from October 2014 and appointments
are now available for booking.
For further advice and to check if you are eligible, please go to the Practice website: chislehurstmedicalpractice.co.uk
WELCOME
The practice are pleased to welcome Sister Dragusha who has joined the
nursing team and Dr Howell.
ONLINE ACCESS FOR MEDICAL RECORDS.
We will be enabling patients to view their medical records online in 2015. Patients should
request a unique PIN from the practice. This will be phased in gradually until the service
becomes fully integrated.
Patients who are already registered for online access to prescribing and appointment booking
will need to contact the practice personally to have this new service added to their log in.
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The Chislehurst Medical Practice PPG Newsletter
IMPORTANT NOTICE
Your G.P. will soon be required to supply your PERSONAL and CONFIENTIAL medical
information to the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) and NHS England. The
date for this has now been delayed until further notice. The Practice has NO choice but to
allow for the extraction of this information. However, individual patients can instruct their
Practice to stop the transfer of their data.
There are pros and cons and you can find details on the Practice’s website
(www.chislehurstmedialpractice.co.uk) to help you decide. If you are happy for your personal
information to be automatically taken from your G.P.’s computer systems then you don’t have
to do anything but, if you are not happy, you MUST inform the Practice who will then block the
uploading of your identifiable and personal information to the HSCIC.
The Practice emphasises that your access to health care and the care that you receive will not
be affected by either decision.
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