Attleborough Surgery
Station Road, Attleborough, Norfolk, NR17 2ASContact details and opening times
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Reviews
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Review titled Awful appointment system
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Anonymous - Posted on 29 July 2024
Trying to get an appointment with Attleborough Surgery has been challenging for a long while (years if you go by the numerous poor online reviews) but somehow it has got even worse! In trying to make an appointment I have found extremely long and slow moving phone queues and an online system that is clunky and often inaccessible. This is particularly challenging as a full time worker starting early in the morning. I know the NHS is facing huge pressures but other practices do not make it so difficult to get an appointment - I have current experience of how other practices work so know this to be true. I know the staff are dedicated and hard working, but something really needs to change with how people access appointments.
Visited July 2024
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 30 July 2024
Thank you for your feedback and we are sorry to learn of the frustrations you have had when trying to access an appointment at the Practice. In order to support access for our working population, our website forms open from 6.30am and our phone lines open at 8.30am. We have also upgraded our telephone system recently which now enables patients to request a call back, rather than waiting on hold; over 6,500 callers have taken advantage of this facility since it went live and we have received very positive feedback on this upgrade. Some patients continue to prefer to wait in a call queue and this is completely the patients choice. The Practice continues to provide significant numbers of face to face appointments every day and we have recently changed how we clinically triage and manage our Same Day Service which supports patients with an urgent health concern. This has increased our face to face capacity for this patient group by almost 30%, while also enabling us to respond to a higher number of patients overall. Our Friends and Family Survey is usually responded to by over 400 patients each month, with a consistent rating of over 90% satisfaction from those patients who have received a service from us. Further details on this survey can be found on our website at www.attleboroughsurgeries.com Demand across the NHS is very high and primary care is no exception to this. We continue to provide a variety of appointment types of face to face, telephone and on-line and this enables us to provide much greater capacity than simply providing face to face appointments alone. Demand will unfortunately always outstrip supply in the NHS, but we thank you for your feedback and your positive comments regarding our staff. We hope that this response has provided some useful information in reply to your feedback.
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Review titled Very poor service
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Linda - Posted on 19 July 2024
My mother is housebound- she has had telephone consultations cancelled with 4 days notice for’an emergency’ I cannot get to speak to a clinician- she has been prescribed inappropriate medication for her condition without being spoken to by a clinician
Visited July 2024
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 22 July 2024
Thank you for your feedback. Unfortunately the Practice is not able to respond to individual complaints via this platform as this would be in breach of data protection arrangements. However, if you would like to contact the Surgery, providing full patient details, in order that we can review the concerns you have detailed, you can do this by contacting the Practice by using the on-line form that is available on our website, or by visiting the Practice.
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Review titled Awful....again
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Melanie Hawes - Posted on 25 March 2024
I have been attempting to get an appointment with someone for a blocked ear that I have had for 2 weeks. I have followed all advice on the NHS website to no avail. I submitted a request for an appointment around half past 7. My symptoms being that I am unable to hear, I have a headache and feel nauseous with the pain in my ear and a continuous whooshing noise made worse whenever I turn my head. The response? We are full, you will need to go to the walk in centre. I don't feel that I am safe enough to drive into a city nor can I sit on public transport for that time with my symptoms. I then called and explained this to the receptionist and noted that my medical records hadn't been passed onto someone medically trained as they would be able to see that I have had this problem many times before as well as a number of operations on my ears that mean this is likely to be an ear infection. I was advised that the reception manager would be in touch, I advised that she would need to email me as I can't hear without someone explaining things to me. Of course an hour later I had a phone call...that I couldn't hear. This is the fourth time I have made a complaint about this practice and none have been acknowledged by the practice manager and they have been sent directly to their email address, says it all really.
Visited March 2024
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 08 April 2024
Thank you for your feedback. Unfortunately the Practice is not able to respond to individual complaints via this platform as this would be a breach of patient confidentiality, but thank you for raising your concerns which we have investigated.
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Review titled Horrendous
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Denise Chatfield - Posted on 04 August 2023
After being on morphine for over 15 years I am now getting a message when I try to order my repeat prescription that I am no longer able to have a repeat! I thought you would need to know contraindications of stopping a controlled drug! Terrible thing to do! It’s bad enough that I’ve been told I have suspected Cancer but I’m not ill enough to get an actual appointment with a Doctor , now I will be so very ill coming off morphine because they won’t give me my prescription!
Visited August 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 08 April 2024
Thank you for your feedback. Unfortunately we are unable to respond to individual complaints or concerns on this platform, due to patient confidentiality. However, we can confirm that as part of our arrangements for the safe management of patient medications, the Practice carries out regular medication reviews and when this is due a medication may be suspended from a repeat list; the medication can still be requested but will be reviewed by a GP or Clinical Pharmacist before being approved. A medication would not be stopped without prior discussion with a patient, or where a serious safety concern was indicated with the patient or medication. We hope that this information has been helpful to your understanding of why a medication may become unavailable to request from a repeat list, with the reason being to ensure that the medication is still being safely taken and continues to be effective and appropriate for the condition for which it was prescribed.
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Review titled Great response
Rated 3 stars out of 5
by Anonymous - Posted on 25 August 2023
I recently requested an opportunity to speak to a diabetic nurse with regards to my blood test results. I used the online contact system. I had a telephone appointment booked within a couple of hours. I spoke to a nurse within a few days. Very pleased with the speed of the response.
Visited August 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 29 August 2023
Thank you for your review and feedback. We are pleased to hear how effectively the system worked for you and the timely support we were able to offer to help you with your health condition.
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Review titled Good and improving
Rated 4 stars out of 5
by Anonymous - Posted on 25 July 2023
Great service. Filled in an online form at 8am, Dr rang at 10am and prescription ready for collection straight away from the dispensary. Dr very friendly, understanding and knowledgeable. Spoke to receptionist at one point who was polite but not particularly helpful, and didn’t seem keen on interacting, perhaps that’s a result of the kind of communication they’ve been getting recently, I don’t know. Overall Good service and much improved from a year ago.
Visited July 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 04 August 2023
Thank you for your positive review. We are very grateful for you taking the time to provide this feedback and for the extra detail relating to your entire interaction with the Practice.
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Review titled Disorganised and dangerous
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Anonymous - Posted on 02 May 2023
This mob are incapable of processing repeat prescriptions. Which isn't difficult, let's face it - there are a team of numerous dispensary staff who are completely unreachable, incapable of doing what is asked for or of actually producing the pills. My mother consistently has problems with getting the pills she orders, month after month and has to fight tooth and nail to get her prescription filled. Utterly useless and potentially dangerous.
Visited May 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 09 May 2023
Thank you for your review and detailing your concerns regarding the management of our repeat prescription arrangements. We have robust systems in place to ensure timely processing of requests and have worked hard to make this a seamless process for the 1,000s of patients who's repeat dispensing requests were managed by our local chemists until they unilaterally withdrew this service, due to their own service pressures. The Practice has taken on this additional work, while also helping patients to register and access the NHS app, which is the quickest and most accurate way to make repeat medication requests. We are sorry to learn that your mother has been having problems and we would be happy to investigate this further if you would like to get in touch with the Practice directly regarding this matter.
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Review titled Worst practice I've ever dealt with
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Anonymous - Posted on 12 May 2023
Having to wait over 2 weeks just for a call back for an issue that leaves you unable to work is crazy. I've yet to have this practice actually be able to help with a single medical issue, the only time I've been able to get help is by diagnosing myself first otherwise it takes months for anything to get sorted. When I did manage to talk to someone last time the Doctor on the phone didn't appear to care about what I was calling for at all and I could barely understand what she was saying as the room was so echoey and it sounded like she was moving furniture around and slamming draws shut. I have 0 faith in this practice at all and wish there was another one in the area to go with. There's are too many houses being built here and not enough GPs
Visited May 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 16 May 2023
Thank you for your feedback and we are sorry to read your review of our Practice and the services we provide. In order to manage patient demand safely we provide a highly resourced same day service for patients with new and/or acute health issues, with other issues being triaged and booked in as timely a way as possible with our team of GPs, Advanced Care Practitioners, Nurse Practitioners, Mental Health and Physio colleagues and Social Prescribers. You have correctly identified that the national shortage of GPs and the increase in patient demand is challenging and is a pressure that most GP Practices are facing, but we are immensely proud of the excellent staff that choose to work at the Surgery and the extended skills that they can offer to support our patients. We have recently employed two new GPs and have two Clinical pharmacists joining our team very soon and have a good history of retaining our staff who feel very rewarded being part of our team and serving our local community.
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Review titled Incapable of safely serving the local community.
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Lydia Rix - Posted on 23 March 2023
Incredibly small surgery for a large patient catchment area, resulting in patients being turned away, unable to seek clinician advice/treatment due appointment request processes being closed, or as the surgery put it in their online statement, "currently unavailable as all routine capacity is now full". Patients despair as their concerning symptoms/ailments don't meet the access criteria for A&E services and are above the remit of local pharmacy services. Dangerous practice such as this has dangerous consequences. How long until the local community of Attleborough pays a fatal price?
Visited March 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 24 March 2023
Thank you for your feedback. We have been working hard for a number of years with our local commissioners in order to secure the essential funds to expand our Practice facilities, so that they remain current and in line with population expansion in Attleborough. We were also part of the Neighbourhood Planning Group for a number of years and worked hard to ensure that health care provision was recognised as a priority for the local town and surrounding villages. Changes within the local and national NHS landscape have made progressing plans challenging, but we remain positive about securing better and larger facilities for the future. In the meantime, the Practice team works incredibly hard to meet the needs of our population, with demand expanding significantly, resulting in the Practice providing over 9,000 more contacts year to date when compared to the previous 12 month period. We have innovated in how we deliver care in order to achieve this additional capacity, with no additional space. The Practice will always work hard to provide on the day access for urgent same day need and where this is not possible, will signpost patients to pharmacy services, NHS 111 or the walk in centre in order for patients to be aware of alternative access where they feel unable to wait. Our routine capacity supports over 18,700 patients and this does often mean that patients do unfortunately have to wait for an appointment.
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Review titled Very poor service
Rated 1 star out of 5
by Susan - Posted on 13 March 2023
Picking up a prescription has never taken less than 20 minutes. In 3 years I have not been able to see a GP face to face. You can't book appointments in advance - forced to fill in an on-line form or queue for ages on the phone. I could go on!
Visited March 2023
Review titled Attleborough Surgery
Replied on 14 March 2023
Thank you for your feedback, which is always appreciated. Unfortunately we continue to be challenged with queue times for prescriptions, which is as a result of a transfer of all repeat prescription management for chemist patients to the Practice and issues relating to local stock availability within our local chemists. We encourage all of our patients to use the NHS app for on-line ordering, but still have a high percentage of patients attending the Practice to request their medications, which impacts on queue times. Regarding face to face appointments, these are still offered every day across all clinical groups including our GPs. Our clinical team triage all patient requests and where a face to face is deemed appropriate this will be offered, although many conditions and health concerns can be managed on the phone or by virtual appointment. In this way, our clinical teams are able to support many more patients each day that would not be possible if all of our patient contacts were face to face appointments. We hope that this response has been helpful in responding to your concerns.