- Extraordinary stories are emerging of what patients are doing simply to get an appointment
- People queue outside from 7am but all the day’s appointments are taken by 8.10am
- One woman said she would consider driving her Eastbourne relative 230 miles to her own doctor in the West Midlands to be seen quickly
- Eastbourne Reporter asks the lead doctor – what is going on?
When Shereen Soliman’s mother-in-law was staying with her in Staffordshire, she wanted to see her own doctor in Eastbourne at the Victoria Medical Centre (VMC) about her chronic lung condition.
So Shereen, 39, drove her mother-in-law, who wants to remain anonymous, 230 miles back to the East Sussex coast, only to find she could not get an appointment despite trying for several days.
Shereen said: “She was staying at our house but decided to wait until she was back in Eastbourne to book a doctor’s appointment as they have all her files.
“She’d been struggling with breathlessness for a few days and I tried to book her an appointment on a Monday. I rang as soon as it turned 8am, as they recommend on the website, to find that I was position 30 in the queue.
“I got cut off when I got to position 19 and when I tried to ring back I couldn’t get through. Either the number cuts out again or it’s a different answerphone message that tells you that all appointments are booked up – at 8.13am.
“We called again later and spoke to a receptionist who told me that there were no appointments that day or all week. I was flabbergasted and asked him to check for the whole month and he said they were all booked too.
“I asked him what to do as my mother-in-law needs her medication reviewed and potentially increased. His answer was that if it gets really bad, call an ambulance.
“I told him this was unacceptable, but he didn’t have any other answers for us.
“It is not appropriate to call an ambulance. It needs someone to look at her records to see what happens next in her treatment.
“I tried to call on Tuesday morning and Wednesday morning and couldn’t get through at all. Even if you do get through, they cut you off before the phone is answered.”
Shereen eventually secured a slot with a nurse the following week after a mid-morning call. But she said: “We’re also investigating opportunities to go private because this system doesn’t work, especially for someone with existing conditions.
“I’m absolutely shocked that this seems to be the norm for this medical centre as it’s not like that in the Midlands.
“I am so surprised that people are accepting it as normal. People should have access to appointments”
Shereen Soliman
“My father was a GP [in Stoke-on-Trent] and there’s no way that this level of service would have been acceptable to him. I’ve never heard anything like it. I understand that the South is more populated than the Midlands, but the level of service provided should be equal to that.
“We could have got her sorted in Staffordshire. I might drive down and collect her to see our doctor if this happens again.
“I am so surprised that people are accepting it as normal. People should have access to appointments – they have paid into the system all their lives.”
The state-of-the-art Victoria Medical Centre opened in 2021 on Victoria Drive. It was built by Primary Health Properties (PHP) at a cost of £8.4 million and merged GP surgeries in converted houses in Green Street, Enys Road and Bolton Road under one roof. The building is let to the GP practice for 25 years.
PHP states on its website here that the VMC replaced “failing GP practices unable to cope with increasing patient demand” and that it was designed to be a “flexible building to meet future demand and changing requirements”.
It is thought around 35,000 patients are registered at the VMC. There are 14 doctors listed on the website here: eight GP partners and six further GPs. This may mean each doctor has a list of 2,500 patients; the Office for National Statistics records here that the average GP patient list was 1,700 in October 2022.
The PHP website also lists 18 nursing posts, four paramedics, 45 GP personal assistants and administration roles, plus six members of a management team.
One woman posted on Facebook that she had queued outside the building from 7am, only to find that she was already fourth in the queue. She was given an appointment in the afternoon.
Eastbourne Reporter was told that on one day last week, there were five doctors on duty. Each would be expected to have a total of 30 appointments in a day. This would equate to 37,800 appointments across full-time working days in a year – about one appointment per patient annually.
Retired psychotherapist Pennie D’Oyly John was 30th in the queue when she rang about a chest infection which required antibiotics. She has multiple health conditions and is unable to leave the house.
Pennie, 73, said a doctor finally sent the drugs to a pharmacy which were then sent around in a taxi. “I could not get to the surgery – I was at home, feeling very, very ill,” she said.
“I am never able to get through to them. I think I should have had my chest heard but nobody ever sees you at the VMC and I don’t know why.
“I have given up hope of ever, ever, ever getting through to them. A friend of mine once queued at 7.30am for me to get an appointment. It is a complete mystery why it is like this.”
This is what happened when the Eastbourne Reporter tried each of the four options listed on the VMC website here to book a genuine routine appointment:
- Book via the NHS App – a message reads “that option is not available for the VMC”.
- Via our online consultation system – I registered, via Engage Consult, with Patient Access, and a message read: “Sorry, your practice does not currently have any appointment slots that can be booked online.” I filled in the ‘advice’ section but have not been contacted.
- Phone the surgery on 01323 407 900 Monday to Friday from 8am to 5:30pm – I was told last week there were absolutely no pre-bookable appointments available. There was a possibility that in another week there might be some but no guarantee. I would have to ring back.
- Visit the surgery and speak with a receptionist, Monday to Friday from 8am to 5:30pm – I visited the surgery, spoke to a receptionist and was told to ring from 8am to 5:30pm to make an appointment.
Eventually, using the phone callback system, a non-urgent appointment in six weeks’ time was booked.
The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics reported here show that of people who had tried to use a GP in the past month in England, 31% described contacting their surgery as difficult and 20% said their overall experience was poor.
Dr Mark Gaffney, chair of the VMC practice, has been contacted for a comment and asked why it is so difficult for patients to book appointments.
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