My GP Practice encourages "Health Awareness" but accuses me of asking for GP booked blood tests unnecessarily!

[Lupiknits]

This is for eeekt particularly. My GP practice has one of those screens giving advice about, for example, how antibiotics don't cure colds. I was practising reading with my one excellent post surgery eye, when the screen went bright red and gave details of sepsis and how important it is to act quickly. So there!

The rest of the appt was a disaster. I was there to follow up my last month's blood test, which my GP had asked me to. The conversation went like this:

"Why do you want a blood test?

Well actually I don't really want one but am responding to a GP request.

What kind do you want?

I'd prefer none, but potassium has been a problem in recent months so let's assume the GP wants that

But you don't need one!

That's fine, I'll be on my way"

Through all this I was showing her the reminders from the surgery on my phone.

Slightly panicked health assistant as I got my coat on

" Oh well, while you're here, you can have one

Is that necessary or a special favour? Is there a reward?"

Two very grumpy people engaged in a blood test.

After that she wanted to know if I did any exercise. I walk the dog around the block. Do I do any housework? Only washing dishes, clothes and bedding; and bleaching the loo. Vacs are too heavy. After that it was diet time. I said it was bad. She assumed cream cakes and pizza. I said, no, just very little of what I can manage that's healthy.

So, I'm a blood test seeking idle annorectic with a mucky house. Good start to a Monday.

Because I'm a nice person I apologised for my testiness at the frustrating mixed messages. She grunted.

[eekt]

Ah, things can only get better...my GP Practice Manager asked me to call to register with a different GP in the practice: I asked which one would have experience of lupus and she said 'I don't think any have a special interest in lupus' 😋 ...I nearly said 'I know that, but which have experience'...but I didn't want to spoil my day 😂

Cracking start to the week LK, good thing she didn't check your BP! Hope recovery from the cataract surgery is going to plan XOX

And glad some GPs are spreading the word about sepsis!

[Lupiknits in reply to eekt]

BP 92/70 . High for me 😂

[PMRpro]

I LOVE your post - I can hear the conversation! Lord - what a load of numpties! Glad they aren't mine - and that covers eekt's lot too...

They are paid quite a lot to be that stupid you know...

[Lupiknits in reply to PMRpro]

Slip me a few tenders and I won't moan!

I think a grunt in reply to my apology in case I appeared narky is really bad form though.

[PMRpro in reply to Lupiknits]

Agreed!

[EOLHPC]

Great post LK 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

And i had a funny haha (not really) example of this at my GP surgery recently:

A NHS letter arrived right after my 65th last month...inviting me to a NHS Health Check at my GPs....l think the letter said these are 30min each. 😯 i thought: let’s see what this consists of 😈!

Reception booked me with the nice Nursing Assistant who i’ve been seeing regularly for years (to give blood 2 monthly for “Shared Care” mycophenolate monitoring + for 6 monthly Nutritional Status monitoring (re AID-related GI tract enteropathy)).

So, she was all ready for me with a check list of questions, including a few basic tests (BP etc). We ran through it all in about 15 minutes. Then she said: Good, you’re FINE! I chuckled and said: Well, not really....as you know from all the appts we keep having. She paused, looked a bit anxious, and said: Um, YES...well, what i mean is, other than all that, you’re FINE! Then, with a flourish, she gave me the nice multicoloured completed check list! I said: Gosh, thanks 😃 - and that was that

🤷🏼‍♀️ SHEESH......🤨🥴🤪🤯🙄😬....XOXO

[Lupiknits in reply to EOLHPC]

😂 my next appointment with my GP is supposed to be the other half of my once a year check up. As it has already been done, no doubt she'll ask me why I'm there. Tempted to say I'd go to a street brawl if invited. In fact, she's going to get mouth to bum close questioning.

Just remembered! My old practice had a sort of rolling film on the screen which told you off for failing to attend appts. I always waited for the messsage saying if you couldn't read or write, go tell reception. Nobody did, but we all held our breath.

[PMRpro in reply to Lupiknits]

THAT made me laugh!

[eekt in reply to EOLHPC]

Oh golly, 'Good, you're fine' ?!? From someone who's been seeing you for years 😳

At that point my BP would have gone through the roof and I'd have had a medical PTSD relapse requiring hospitalisation 😵

It kind of sums it all up: GPs can't see past normal BP, BMI, the routine blood tests plus the lifestyle questions. Pity you didn't have a nutrition packet to hand that you could have left her for lunch 😕

Hugs Coco XOX

[EOLHPC in reply to eekt]

😆 Am such an old dog now (65 going on 95 😉), the responses don’t 🚀 any longer...they’re more like a slow burn...and oh my does it feel absolutely fab when you guys do the 🚀 reaction “ for me” 👍👍👍👍...i did, though, say to her with that chuckle: well, i may be FINE by these standards, but i can’t tolerate food by mouth! In response her dear face went 🙁...and, me being me, i actually felt sorry for her...silly me, cause, after all, this is the same GP surgery that willfully pulled Occam’s Razor on my case over & over & over...missing all the red flags that consistently had been alerting them to my underlying AID for 20 years

Over the decades, i’ve been assigned to 3 diff GPs at this practice ...by the time the 2nd of those GPs left a few years ago, my infant onset lupus diagnosis had been recovered & i was responding pos to treatment. I needed something or other, so had a final appt with him...there was something rather touching about this young man, and i felt he had more or less tried his best for me (by then i better understood how GPs tend to struggle to spot rare illnesses, and my version of lupus is especially rare due to my seronegativity being caused by both my early onset Antibody Deficiency Disease AND by my extremely early AID onset reinforcing premature immunoscenescence), so i was about to thank him for “trying” on my behalf...when he burst out with: are you going to sue me? I was flabbergasted 😧...and instinctively replied: of course not! But now, having had 7 years of being, in effect, debriefed & reeducated by you guys, i better appreciate why he was wondering 🤣😘🍀

[AgedCrone]

If I were you I'd explain to your GP the difficulty you are having getting the blood tests he asks for without the usual signed request form. Ask him (nicely) next time he wants you to have a blood test could he either email you a request form with the tests he needs, or leave it for you to collect at the practice reception.

We have enough to put up with having needles stuck into us regularly, without having an inquisition at the same time!

I know my hospital Phlebotomy dept would not take blood from me if I just went in & said I wanted a random blood test........& the phlebotomist at the GP surgery (who is 'she who must be obeyed') would just call the doctor concerned & ask him for the form "now"!

Hope things go better next time !

[Lupiknits in reply to AgedCrone]

Problem here is that the GP rang after the last lot of tests to say she was sorry but they needed repeating, please make an appt for a month's time.

I've worked out that the grumpy nurse was looking at the last rheumy clinic tests which were borderline fine but for the Vit D. I got the rheumy letters but not copies of tests or I might have cancelled yesterday.

The doc is being told all this is a bit of a waste of time, and no excuse for nurse's attitude.

I'm also asking why I have a tiddly amount of D3 prescribed to " correct" the deficiency when I take far larger amounts daily. The tiddly amount after the last clinic and what I take anyway is not working. That will come under the mouth to bum discussion I'm keen on. There's nothing left of my annual review to cover except " do you take your meds"? when I say "Of course" through gritted teeth.

[AgedCrone in reply to Lupiknits]

Oh dear that does sound very annoying.....my sense of humour rapidly deserts me when NHS is at its usual chaotic worst.

On my present regime I need 4 different blood tests prior to my infusions, so I suggested to my Rheumy nurse that to save me going in every time to get the forms, that she gave undated copies of each form, I then photocopied them, & at the appropriate time I date them, & take them to the hospital to get the tests done. It has worked well...except one time my photo copy cut off one edge of the form.....but I managed to remember the missing numbers & all was OK.

I don't know why the GP can't order any sort of test on line & the patient makes the appointment, & when they turn up, the provider just looks on line.

Oh...I forgot.....it's the NHS.....Computer Say No!

[Lupiknits]

I've spoken to a receptionist about yesterday's fiasco. He couldn't understand why on Earth I had trouble yesterday because the computer said all OK. I Love our receptionists! I could hear him saying "b***** me" though he had his hand over the phone!