Access Policy – Gardens Surgery
This practice offers the following urgent need access to its services from 8am – 6.30 pm
Monday – Friday. Between 6.30 pm & 8am weekdays and throughout the weekend, patients
should call SELDOC on 020 8693 9066 for out-of-hours services and A&E for medical
emergencies.
Same day Dr’s appointments:
Dr’s offer routine pre-booked appointments but for urgent need, the practice also provides
one GP on duty every morning who will see 20 patients who call the same day. This service
is for urgent, same-day appointments and is not used for follow up appointments for longterm conditions or for multi-problem consultations. The Practice also provides a few pm
same-day appointments on a similar basis. Children under 5 will always be seen if urgent.
They are seen after surgery in the morning as extras so there may be a wait, and in the
afternoon, the parent may be asked to speak to a GP before being added to this list. These
consultations are not for routine problems.
Same day phone in service:
Those GPs who are providing routine pre-bookable appointments also have 5 same-day
phone appointments (3 midday and 2 late afternoon each) available to book. Patients book a
time slot for the morning appointments and call the GP at that time. If the GP is still busy
after the 1st call, they will ring the patient back. For evening telephone appointments, the GP
will call back. One nurse has 3 same-day bookable telephone appointments available on 3
out of 4 days.
Home visits:
Patients may request a routine Home visit in the morning (in order that the visit can take
place between morning and afternoon surgery). These visits are for patients who cannot get
to the surgery. Contact details need to be given in order that the GP can speak to the patient
and agree the home visit or an alternative course of action if appropriate. Home visits are
accepted later in the day for emergencies. The surgery will take calls for emergency home
visits up to 6.30 pm, Monday to Friday. On Tuesdays – Fridays the phone goes over to
SELDOC out-of-hours service at 6.30pm. On Mondays, due to the extended hours service
there is a service for pre-booked appointments after 6.30 pm and receptionists will answer
routine calls, but Dr’s are seeing patients so no emergency home visits can be accepted
after this time. Any requests for emergency home visits after 6.30pm should be addressed to
SELDOC.
Reviewed at PPG meeting 15/01/14
G/Policies/Access Policy current
G/Policies/Access Policy current