Hi all. Has anyone ever had an unexpected, unprompted text from their GP with a link to complete a depression/anxiety questionnaire? I’ve received two such texts since my recent visits to GP and A&E.
I have some but not all blood results from GP.
B12 217ng/L (145-910)
Folate 6.2ug/L (3.0-20.0)
Ferritin 49ug/L (10-150)
I’m pleased with vitamin D at 145.1nmol/L (50.0-250.0).
I continue to feel unwell with fatigue, nausea and tingling in legs/ feet and hands etc. I’m waiting for Medichecks thyroid results.
I have to say the texts are making me feel a tad paranoid 😬
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pj16
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Your folate would be better in the upper half of the reference range, so with your range this would be 11.5 - 20. Some people aim for a result of 20 with this range.
Please note that some people supplementing high dose B12 find they also need to take foods containing potassium for a couple of weeks to avoid side effects..
Not from my GP though I’ve taken part in a couple of research surveys for a PHD student. They asked about 50 - 100 questions, often covering similar ground. I suspect so that you got bored and gave your first answer by the end. After a couple of months of regular surveys, I came to my own conclusion: “I was basically happy apart from when filling in questions about depression” (also on weight loss and some diabetes related stuff). Since giving up such surveys I’m generally happier and contented with my lot!! 😀👍🫢
Sounds like they're drumming up business. I believe they're encouraged to diagnose as many people with depression and get them on anti-depressants as possible.
The gov has realised there is a growing mental health crisis so aims to fix it with questionaires, promises of more support. The problem is that there are not enough trained clinicians but a quick bandaid will fix that right? Anyone would think there is an election coming🙄
I think that to a large extent the "mental health crisis" is manufactured rather than real.
It seems to me that governments around the world (and particularly so in the UK) want to cut costs for everything to do with health. This is either to drive people into the arms of the private sector or to increase profits for the private sector, and I include insurance companies in that.
I suspect doctors have joined in the cost-cutting just so they keep their jobs, and more and more of their training seems to suggest everything patients want treatment for is not a physical problem it is a mental problem.
And to do this they don't test, they don't treat, they don't refer to specialists, and they suggest everything invisible is "in the patient's head" i.e. they are mentally ill. The only treatment many of us are offered is anti-depressants.
I knew someone who died of ovarian cancer. It went untreated for a year because the doctors didn't diagnose, she was repeatedly fobbed off, and eventually her only treatment before diagnosis was anti-depressants. After diagnosis they gave her a hysterectomy, discovered the original cancer, discovered it had spread, and before she even had a chance to recover from her surgery she died.
I have many other anecdotes of a similar nature. And disbelief in women's pain in particular is a choice that doctors make to save money, particularly in older people.
Children don't get off scot-free either. Some of them get diagnosed with FND or CFS or, if they are young enough they might be diagnosed with "oppositional defiant disorder" and if they don't do what they are ordered to do they get taken away from their parents and forced to take drugs. Many children are given psychiatric drugs that mess with their brains for life.
Grief has been turned into a mental disorder as well.
I had an Aunt and a friend who were fobbed off until it was too late to survive ovarian cancer.
My Aunt only got investigative tests after she went in with her husband.
Previously, she was sent away with, "you need to exercise for your back pain" and goodness-knows-what-else.
Agree also with, "they don't test, they don't treat, they don't refer to specialists, and they suggest everything invisible is "in the patient's head".
-I've seen this blame-game for 40 years, and prior to cost-cutting.
Suspect it started with long-term dumbing-down of education; starting from junior schools right through to university.
You are extremely perceptive in your comments and posts. It is manufactured to keep the pharmaceutical companies in business.
Today, I was supposed to attend a lecture on Menopause and Mental Health. They are trying to fob women off with antidepressants and CBT. No, they are going through a biological process with hormonal changes.
Sadly, I could not attend as I have injured my shoulder and was with my chiropractor. Please note that the chief in editor of the British Medical Journal, Kamran Abbasi has written extensively about the over diagnoses of Mental Health illnesses and its harms.
The lady who died of ovarian cancer and your other anecdotes are not just cases. There are organisations that collect proper statistics, facts and figures on thousands of others that this has happened to. The gender based discrimination is noted and commented on as is the approach to women of ethnicity.
Last year, I had a telephone GP appointment and I simply stated, I have received a lot of Discrimination. I smiled at the panic in the doctor’s voice when they said, Not from me.
It did also trigger a text for a Patient Reported Experience Measure. Needless, to say, I did not complete it because I do not interact with robots.
Well, they have been for quite some time. When I was still at school and showing typical hypo symptoms my GP wanted to send me to a psychiatrist. I'm 78 now, so that was a long time ago!
Exactly! Whenever things get too complicated for them - and, frankly, it doesn't take a lot - they find some way to blame the patient. This is just one of those ways. And all so that they don't have to think about it too much because it's too hard for their little brains.
My surgery sends me invites to absolutely everything. 2 most recent examples were a dementia study and a sexual health study (last one clearly aimed at the younger age bracket 😂). None of the invites have been relevant to me, so don't worry and don't give yours a second thought!
My surgery was badgering my husband to fill in an ethnicity survey constantly earlier this year. He kept getting texts which said " this is your last chance to fill in our survey blah blah" until they sent him a new one the following week lol.
What a waste of time and resources. Its of no benefit to patients filling in stuff like this. I've got round this by asking my surgery to contact me by phone or letter, not texts.
Read some years ago that seniors have some of the highest rates of sexually-transmitted diseases. Some of it due to not worrying about getting pregnant and not using protection.
Wow 😧 I should be so lucky! I’ve just turned 60 and have had problems ‘down there’ for 14 years. Have seen at least 3 each (have lost count) of dermatologists and gynaecologists and I still believe I haven’t got a correct diagnosis.
Hello...no,I haven't had any such texts from GP...but there is a self-completion 'test' on GP surgery website that one can fill in to check depression - but ive never been prompted by surgery to do so.
Hi I had to fill in form before attending for my follow up for Hodgkin's lymphoma. As result I attended 10 sessions with " depression care manager" now I am discharged.
Ignore it. Much of the money given to the NHS and GP surgeries is target led. So for instance they'll be told 'we'll give you £xxxx per year when you've screened xx% of your patients every year for depression'.
Tremendous thanks to you all as usual! I will completely ignore the text. The reminder stated “there’s still time to complete your questionnaire”. I’m now thinking - time before what!😜
unfortunately, you are probably just a statistic, female of a certain age. or patient who has had more than 3 GP appointments in 6 months or something.. Some bright spark is wanting to know how depressed a certain group are for, doubtless, some more efficient way to deal with said group. I wouldn't take it personally, they are just doing some stats
The thing is It's such a commonly used questionnaire that's used it can be manipulated and it's certainly not meant to be used in isolation. It was common practice to use it when I worked in psychiatry and I was presented it by gp. I refused to fill it in as I could have given answers that would have made me out to have no problems or be a suicidal nervous wreck. The gp had never realised that it was that easy to manipulate and threw it away. Unless you have been feeling anxious or depressed ignore it otherwise ask to see your gp and fill it in with theIfdalso ask why they are sending them .
I once realised that the GP’s front desk had set their printer machine to do double-sided printing without telling the hospital this. The hospital’s robots (machines) that read and decode blood request forms, before submitting blood for processing only - I was told this by the phlebotomist who pointed out the problem to me, as I arrived with my double sided form, after a previous test result did not return - can only read one side of a form and then discard it.
I pointed the problem out to the GP practice. They admitted the problem. I suggested they go back over the last 6 months and see who else this problem applied to, ie. Who was still awaiting test results. “We can’t possibly do that - it would take far too long” was the response.
So well done for having an impact on your GP surgery’s action - not an easy thing to achieve! It took me a long time to convince my GP I was telling the truth even though the phlebotomist gave me her number and I passed it onto the practice, saying that they could speak to her and she would explain where they were going wrong.
My old practice was a mega GP practice, the kind often praised by ministers and MPs but absolutely useless if you were a patient because you were also being told, in sideways fashion, that if you attended more than the average person that you were attending too often.
They missed the fact that when I reported my daughter (a baby) was crying all the time and that her older brother had never done this and that I’d checked all the usual things and was worried, she was suffering from a bad case of bronchiolitis. Their answer “babies cry”. 3 days later she was admitted to intensive care for 6 days and narrowly missed being intubated.
In the reception it was possible to see the board with the % rate their targets for eg, flu vaccines were being hit / missed. They didn’t ever seem to have a target for patient satisfaction / health.
I wouldn’t answer this questionnaire even if I received it.
Unhappiness due to debt / domestic abuse / job loss / grief / hypothyroidism / other situations that call for practical help signposting is hard / impossible to tell apart on paper from clinical depression that can’t be shifted even if objective life and family factors are all stable and sound.
"They didn’t ever seem to have a target for patient satisfaction / health."
-Yes, some would say those would be more important.
Hi pj16
I'm finding there's no such thing as medical privacy. Everything is stored online.
Recently, I had to apply to a specialist with a 13 page form requesting all my details, current and historical.
This information, according to the included information with this form, was to be stored online with a private company.
I've always declined to have the government receiving/storing my medical records.
But I know that every scan/x-ray/mri/blood test/public hospital appointment/whatever-else is stored online somewhere by the public and private companies involved.
pj16, if your dr hasn't the decency to look you in the face and ask you about your health, I wouldn't waste time with an information-gathering survey.
Could you block the text number?
By the way, tingling in my hands, feet, legs, arms and at my worst, over my head was one of my symptoms.
Believe it was hypo, HowNowWhatNow , Last B12 test was a little under optimal and the Active B12 was optimal. Not to say, though, that levels haven't dropped since.
Am doing private tests soon and will be including the B12.
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