Booking an Appointment
To book an appointment, please call the health centre on 0345 013 0710. You will be asked to give a brief description of your symptoms to one of our reception team, who will organise the most appropriate appointment for you.
If you require an urgent appointment on the same day, you may be passed to our pager team who will call you back when they are available. Please note that due to this, we cannot give exact call times for the pager team.
In the event of a medical emergency, please call 999.
Can another Healthcare Professional help?
Do you need to see the GP?
Sometimes the GP is not the most appropriate Healthcare Professional to deal with your ailment. Please see the information on see a Doctor or Healthcare Professional, which might help you decide whether a GP appointment is truly necessary or whether it might be better for you to see a Pharmacist, Optician, Dentist or other Healthcare Professional. You can even self-refer for some services without seeing your GP.
For real life-threatening emergencies such as those below – RING 999
- Chest pain (suspected heart attack)
- Suspected stroke
- Suspected meningitis
- Anaphylactic shock (severe allergy)
- Heavy bleeding or deep lacerations
- Fluctuating levels of consciousness or completely unconscious
- Difficulty breathing or stopped breathing with a change in colour
- New seizure, fit or uncontrollable shaking
For immediately serious conditions such as the following, GO TO Emergency Department (A&E) IMMEDIATELY
- A fever and lethargic (drowsy) child
- A feverish and floppy (unresponsive) infant
- Difficulty breathing
- Sudden, severe abdominal pain
- Accidental or intentional overdose of medication
- Trauma (including falls) and possible broken bones or road traffic accident
Patients who have a problem outwith the surgery opening hours that can’t wait until the surgery reopens should contact NHS24 by dialling 111.
Your appointment at the Practice
- Please make one appointment for each member of the family who needs to be seen
- We try to keep to time but please be patient if someone before you takes longer than planned
- It is Practice Policy to allow patients to choose whichever Doctor they wish to attend in the Practice. We will honour this as far as possible, however you may be offered a sooner appointment with another GP if you need to be seen more urgently.
Please help us
If you are not able to attend your appointment please let us know in time so that the time can be used for someone else. If you are late for an appointment you may be asked to re-book.
Emergencies
These will be dealt with promptly. Telephone 0345 013 0710 and give as much information to the receptionist who will relate the details to the duty doctor.
Additional information
Can I bring someone to accompany me to the Appointment?
We are generally very happy for patients to bring with them a carer, relative or even a friend. This often helps, particularly when they know you well and it allows them to tell us any observations they would make about you, which can help us in undertaking our assessment. Ultimately this will lead us more quickly to make an accurate diagnosis and therefore help you more.
Also, having someone with you means they can prompt you to ask questions that you may have forgotten, and after the appointment they can help in reminding you what was discussed.
Occasionally we might ask for them to leave but this would be unusual.
If you require interpretation services please contact us in advance of you appointment and we will arrange this.
If you have a suspected infectious disease
Please inform reception if you suspect an infectious disease, as this will enable us to deal with it appropriately during your visit to protect you, other patients and staff.
Giving Consent for Treatment
You have the right to accept or refuse treatment that is offered to you, and not to be given any physical examination or treatment unless you have given valid consent. If you do not have the capacity to do so, consent must be obtained from a person legally able to act on your behalf, or the treatment must be in your best interests.
Your valid consent (agreement to the course of action) is needed for the treatment that’s offered to you before any physical examinations or treatment can be given. If you haven’t given your consent, you can accept or refuse treatment that’s offered to you.
It’s important to be involved in decisions about your treatment and to be given information to help you choose the right treatment. When making treatment choices, you’ll often discuss the options with your doctor or another healthcare professional.
Signposting
The Practice is continuously trying to develop ways to make the patient contact with the Practice as seamless as possible.
Our aim is to improve the method in which we deliver our services to our patients. In order to do this, the Practice has introduced a signposting system for appointments. This is to ensure that patients are seen by the most appropriate member of the clinical team based upon medical needs and condition at the time.
When appointments are being booked Administration staff will allocate the appointment to the most suited person depending upon your need at the time. It is therefore very important when asked, that you provide the Administration staff with an idea as to what the appointment is for, in order to expedite your care with the most appropriate person. Our Administration staff are not prying; they are working under our explicit instructions, and are bound by the same code of confidentiality as the clinical staff. Please help them to help you.
We would wish to reassure our patients that the Doctors work very closely at all times with all clinical staff and are fully involved in every aspect of your medical care.