KEEPING an appointment at a health centre now is more mentally challenging than it used to be, and I don't mean the problem of getting an appointment in the first place.
We've all become used to that frustration, of the next available appointment with a specific doctor being three days to a week away. Like the original, inimitable Reggie Perrin played in the television series by Leonard Rossiter trying to make an ap
pointment with his boss CJ, my side of the conversation usually goes like this:
"I'd like an appointment to see Dr A, please. Early this morning or late this afternoon would suit me. All right, any doctor. Fine. See Dr X next Thursday at 11.50."
I don't blame anyone in particular for this, not least because by the law of averages I'll probably have to visit a doctor again some time and would like to be on good terms with whoever it is when I do.
They're skilled people, helpful and sympathetic, willing to listen, who deserve their holidays and hefty salary– and if that doesn't guarantee an earlier appointment next time, what will? – and it must be tempting to say "There's a lot of it about, take two paracetamol" to hypochondriacs.
But as always on my luckily few, usually brief, visits – two paracetamol can be surprisingly effective – I compare and contrast our modern health centre with its squad of doctors and staff to the small Borders town surgery of not much more than a generation ago where two doctors seemed to work steadily through a waiting room of patients on a first come, first seen, basis.
That might be rosy glow – or in that surgery's case, dark brown and tobacco-stained – nostalgia, and there might well have been even then a receptionist to interrogate callers and provide an over-the-phone diagnosis to save a visit. But in memory that system seemed brisker and more efficient than it is now with all modern aids.
Which is what I meant earlier about the need to be mentally alert in a health centre. Where once the patient could advise one of several receptionists of arrival, we now tap our details into a computer screen. Not many, not complicated, although some people still manage to tap in the wrong month – yes, got it right on the second attempt – and in return the screen confirms doctor, time and room to go to. But one less human contact.
While waiting to be called, I used to read. Now the patient has to be alert for the computer beep as a name appears in large red letters on a screen. It can be several beeps before your name comes up, each one an interruption and a re-read paragraph.
Better to forget about reading and watch the screen showing a series of common health problems and their symptoms. Diarrhoea? Constipation? Cough? Depression? Not when I came in. A symptom is lack of appetite? Nope, obviously not suffering from depression. In fact while sitting here my minor problem now seems to have become so minor I'll just go and give someone else the chance to have an appointment on time.
Ah, too late. I've just been beeped.
The full article contains 545 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
