The Practice Furzedown

I have to say, initially I was hesitant because of reviews to join this practice, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised. They have an app where you can book your appointments and there’s lots of options available! The doctors I’ve encountered so far have all been kind and helpful as well as taken time to listen to my problems even if it goes above the 10 min slot. Reception don’t always know what they’re doing because of lack of communication with each other but they eventually sort it out amongst them. Practice is simple and quiet which is nice for a change!

I have been very impressed with my Doctor and The reception staff at the surgery.
Nothing is too much of a bother.
I met Zaman for the 1st time today excellent telephone skills very polite and professional.
It was lovely to see Liz who is always so cheerful.
Thank you so much for all you do at this time and always.
Much appreciated
Matilda

Reception are usually friendly depending who answers the phone.
Doctors are never the same.
They almost killed my mother by misdiagnosed water retention. They seem not to have duty of care for patients. They kept thobbing my mother off as age and saying its normal for old age to keep water retention, Only after 2 weeks in hospital after doctor J.Patel sent her to A&E. She is now recovering and has lost over 16kg of fluid. This could have been very dangerous and over 2 years no one took any care.

Pretty awful Doctors surgery. Always late for appointments and now they have a sign up saying 'appointments run 20-30 minutes late, apologies'. Rather than apologise, get a better system in place that allows you to run on time. I've never had this from any other GP surgery so it's not inevitable that every appointment runs late.

I was diagnosed with cancer last year, and this went through all of 2020, The team were so very supportive, I cannot fault them, Elizabeth, called me regularly once a week to see how I was doing and was very reassuring. I have just been given the all clear for now and could not have done it without the support of the team, and to name a few Elizabeth, Elenore, Pearl and the doctors and other staff. YOU ARE THE BEST.

I have had great difficulty booking appointments at this practice. I was told I had to get antenatal appointments there, with my GP but the receptionist kept on saying they would call me back, then didn’t. This went on for weeks. There after they booked me an appointment that I hadn’t asked for, on the wrong week, without telling me and it came through on the app and I called them back and still couldn’t get an appointment. This happened twice for two different appointments I required. Their personal manner has also been consistently rude. Like others have commented, the receptionists seem almost sleepy and very disinterested and on occasions I have called, they picked up the phone and then ignored me.

On top of this, a nurse had written on my medical notes that I was 20 weeks pregnant when I had only just turned 10. This resulted in them giving me my vaccines far too early and now we are unsure if the baby is protected and I cannot have another vaccine.

I was informed by the doctor that this should not have been booked by the receptionist, nor should the nurse have given me this. The doctors have been lovely and very attentive, however I feel the service around booking and the receptionist has been consistently bad and I would be mindful of this. It seems that the receptionist are acting as gatekeepers for access to appointments, but are not knowledgeable enough to know when appointments should be booked.

This practice is awful. From the reception staff right through to the doctors. The doctor I've seen on most occasions couldn't be much more unhelpful. I get the impression the reception staff absolutely hate their job and the people they have to deal with. When going in worried about my health, I've been asked "what do you expect us to do about it" & have not felt one iota of empathy from any person at the practice. Every visit has been a poor experience. I once had to do a stool test in the toilet (only available toilet was in the waiting area and the taps didn't work to wash my hands). I then asked where to put the specimen and bag and the receptionist told me "just put it over there, I don't want to see your poo", in a busy reception area. Really frustrating and am going to join a different practice. Sort yourselves out

Day by day it gets worse. Despite the fact takes ages to make an appointment only to be rushed during your consultation. Let alone speaking about never being on time as waiting time can be 30min plus.

Getting prescriptions sent on time and properly to the pharmacy can be a mission! After having an appointment and the doctor mentioning that all the medication required will be there, most of the times it is not. I had to keep calling back and forth from the pharmacy to the GP and from the GP to the pharmacy to only have the same answer ‘I see this is send they must have it’ (GP) . Not all receptionists are bad but there are some that clearly would need some training.

Being a receptionist myself in a hotel I would never dare to sight or to interrupt when someone is explaining something. Not even bothering to check or to speak with someone regarding the matter.

Playing with someone’s health it is not a joke and I’m sorry to say but this is what happens here. There are plenty of more things I could mention but it would be pointless. If you want to come to this GP please don’t. And if someone sees this please do improve your service.

UPDATE: So after booking an appointment to get a prescription for tablets THAT SHOULD be on the repeat (every month we had to call regarding the same issue). I had an appointment scheduled to 11am on Thursday 15 min gone by and no call so I decided to give them a call, I was informed that the dr would call. Another, half an hour has gone by and nothing... 45min and nothing so I decided to call again they told me they were waiting for a translator (Which is Bs since it is always booked and I’m always there to translate) the receptionists kindly informed the doctor about it. 1 h goes by and still no call, I decided to call back just to have the receptionist saying ‘the dr called but no one answered’ I told them it was impossible, we didn’t have any messages, no missed calls nothing. I informed the receptionist who at this point was also clueless about what is going on (definitely not their fault). I could be waiting until now (Saturday) to see if they would call.

CONCLUSION: We moved GP’s because this was the Cherry on top of the cake.

SO PLEASE, IF YOU WANT A PROPER GP AND GET TREATED THIS IS NOT THE ONE.