Face to face appointments

[GarryS]

Since lockdown I have not had an appointment with my consultant: no lung function testing, no chest x-rays. I have bronchiectasis too and sarcoidosis, which is now quiescent. In this time I have had one telephone appointment. Pre-COVID lockdown I was seen regularly every 6 months. Anyone else experiencing this?

[Troilus]

Hi GarryS. My answer is yes to a degree. Following a phone call before vaccinations when things were pretty bad, I was invited in. They wanted to do spirometry and FeNo test, but I refused. (They had told me it was for blood tests.)

After that I had a yearly phone call from my consultant - prior to the pandemic I was seen in clinic every 3 months. Last year I didn’t get a call - I put it down to drs strikes.

If you are concerned you could either contact your consultant’s secretary or if you know who is in charge of the outpatients clinic you attend (in my case it is a Sister) you could try ringing them to discuss any problems you are having. At one point I did this and she was able to prescribe for me and email my GP to get the new inhaler on my repeat prescription.

[Homely2 Administrator]

After covid I was ignored for a year and a bit, the hospital said it accidentally deleted me from their systems. It is worth a phone call to the consultants secretary.

[Pipsqueak77]

Hi GarryS

Yes!

All I can say is thank goodness I am on a biologic. This means my tertiary clinic have to check up on that every few months.

However, my secondary care team have disappeared off the face of the earth…! Even though I get admitted to this hospital several times a year and my tertiary have instructed them on many occasions to partake in the ‘shared care’ they agreed to give me..

Sorry not much help to you, but you are not alone. When my check ups for the biologic finish, I have no idea what will happen. 🤔😕

Good Luck!👍😊 and here’s hoping…🤞

[Emaych61]

I’ve not had this problem with Respiratory (they’ve been really good!!) but I have recently had something similar with Gastroenterology. I last saw my gastro con fourteen months ago. Since then, despite having two procedures, I’ve not had even a phone consultation. After a flare up of symptoms at the beginning of this month I contacted her secretary to let her know there was a problem and to ask when I was likely to be seen. I was told I was up for review (yeh - been there for nearly a year actually) but the only suggestion was that in the meantime it might be better to go to my GP ( er, excuse me, the reason I’m under consultant led care is because the GPs have admitted this is really beyond them!!). She also suggested I talk to medical outpatients. Medical outpatients were, I think, a little exasperated (with the secretary) that I was sent through to them (“your consultant’s secretary could have explained how things are working at the moment - you didn’t need to be sent through to us”) but warned me that for my consultant it was going to be another 4/5 months before I was likely to hear anything. Sigh!!!

[Patk1]

I don't think health cares returned to pre covid.it is there when Yr able to access it but I've found we need to be much more proactive in seeking help whn it's needed.