July 2024 Patient Newsletter
📆 Waiting for GP appointments: the truth behind the numbers
Have you had to wait longer for a GP appointment recently? “It was quicker five years ago” is a common response we hear from patients. It’s frustrating, isn’t it? Believe us when we tell you we’re frustrated, too!
The truth is, general practice across the UK is struggling. At Tudor Lodge, we’re working flat out and delivering more appointments than we did five years ago. In June alone, we handled over 2,500 online requests, delivered more than 3,100 appointments, and authorised nearly 1,500 prescriptions.
Despite our best efforts, the reality is that it’s still not enough. The funding practices like ours receive simply don’t match the ever-growing needs of patients today. Did you know that for each patient, we receive just £107.57 a year from the NHS? That’s less than the cost of your TV licence, or 30p a day. And when you consider the average patient needs six appointments a year, it doesn’t take much to realise the sums don’t add up.
This impacts our ability to recruit much-needed extra staff and offer enough appointments. It also means that when someone misses an appointment without cancelling – and we had 178 of those last month – it has a big knock-on effect, making someone else wait longer.
We know you value your GP, and we want to be there for you. Your GP is highly trained to manage complex health problems, spot serious symptoms and ensure you get the right specialist care if needed. But we need fair funding to make sure general practice survives.
Our team wants the same things that you do. We believe nobody should struggle to see their family doctor and we believe our patients deserve better than this. We really hope the new Government makes general practice a priority before it’s too late. In the meantime, we thank you for bearing with us at busy times, cancelling appointments you no longer need and treating our team with kindness and respect – it really means a lot to us all!
🔥 Managing eczema in the heat
Ahead of the next spell of hot weather in London (we can dream, right?), our nurses have put together some practical tips for managing eczema flare-ups:
- Pat sweat away gently with a soft, clean towel rather than rubbing. Change out of damp clothes promptly to prevent skin irritation. Consider using a mild, fragrance-free antiperspirant on areas prone to sweating, but avoid applying it to broken or irritated skin.
- If swimming in a pool, rinse off immediately afterwards and apply moisturiser. Consider using a barrier cream before swimming to minimise chlorine contact with the skin. Salt water or sea swimming can sometimes be less irritating than chlorinated pools.
- Itching? Keep your antihistamines on hand to manage itching and use cold compresses to soothe irritated areas. Keep your nails short and clean to minimise damage from scratching and consider digging the cotton gloves out at night if you’re a sleep scratcher.
🌞 Cool off this summer
If you’re looking to cool down when the weather warms up again, remember that Tooting Bec Lido is now open.
Every day, 250 free tickets are available for Wandsworth residents on means-tested benefits.
☀️ Going on holiday?
There are two things to stop and double-check right now: travel vaccines (and whether you need them for the country you’re visiting) and your repeat prescriptions. Avoid last-minute panic by:
- Contacting us 6-8 weeks before travel if you need travel vaccines. You can find out whether you need them for your travel destination here.
- Ordering your repeat prescription the week before it runs out. We always ask patients to leave 3 days for the surgery to issue your prescription and another 3-4 days for the pharmacy to make up your prescription.
- Remembering prescriptions can take up to two hours to arrive on the pharmacy system once we’ve sent it to them.
- Checking your NHS App to check on the progress of your prescription request. Just head to Your Health > View and manage prescriptions to see when we’ve viewed and approved it. If you need your medicines urgently once approved, please contact your pharmacy.
🍈 How to check your breasts
Our practice is proud to support the NHS Breast Screening Programme. If you’ve been invited for breast screening, we hope you’ll choose to have it.
Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer in the UK and your risk of getting breast cancer goes up as you get older. About 4 out of 5 breast cancers are found in women over 50 years old. Screening helps to find breast cancers at an early stage when they are too small to see or feel.
💪🏼 Banish aches and pains with our in-house physio
Are your morning aches and pains starting to be a daily hindrance? Has watching the Euros 2024 left you with an armchair injury? (Yes, it’s happened already, you’re not alone!) Simran, Tudor Lodge’s in-house physiotherapist could be the help you need to banish those niggles.
Did you know that physios train for longer than GPs on problems with muscles, bones and joints so they’re the best people to see for musculoskeletal problems? You don’t need to see a GP first which often means you’ll be seen faster and if you need a sick (fit) note or medication following your appointment, Simran can arrange all of these for you while you’re there with a GP. Book an appointment with Simran.
💟 Samaritans 24/7
