We have listened to feedback from patients about the problems getting appointments at the surgery and difficulty getting through on the phone. We now use Patchs online to manage all requests from patients coming into the surgery so that we can best allocate the resources we have, to help the most people we can, and help us to ensure prioritisation of more urgent problems. This is called a total triage system.
All patients who need to contact the surgery either for an appointment, for medical advice or for Fit (Sick) notes will be asked to submit their request through the PATCHs online portal.
Our opening times to submit requests are from 6am to 12pm Monday, 6am to 2pm Tuesday to Friday. (We may have to close patchs early sometimes if we are facing overwhelming demand)
We aim to respond to all requests promptly, dealing with the most urgent ones first. However we aim to review and triage all requests the same working day.
To submit a request through PATCHS follow this link: PATCHS
What is Patchs?
Patchs is an online consultation system, developed in collaboration with the University of Manchester, that allows patients to contact their GP to request appointments, advice or anything they would traditionally have achieved by speaking to a receptionist by completing an online request form. This is with the aim to improve access for patients, and to allow GP surgeries to more efficiently manage the ever increasing demand that they face.
For more information please see the following webpage: PATCHS for Patients | PATCHS
What is Total Triage and how does it work?
All submitted requests will be processed by a member of our team. Clinical requests will be processed by a GP, and may result in an appointment being offered for telephone or face to face assessment, or your issue may be able to be managed without the need for an appointment.
If an appointment is required you will either be contacted by phone or text to be informed of your appointment time or may provided with a link to book an appointment for yourself.
We now have multiple healthcare professionals working at the practice. The aim of this change is to try and get patients to see the most appropriate medical professional first time, this may be a GP, paramedic, advanced nurse practitioner, practice nurse, healthcare assistant, pharmacist or physiotherapist.
Also we hope that many requests can be dealt with without the need for an appointment saving you time, and allowing that appointment to be used by somebody else.
Please see below for some concerns we think people may have:
- Can I book an appointment for my child, family member or someone I care for?
- Yes, you can submit a proxy request on behalf of someone you care for:
- I am unable to complete the online form as I am not confident/able to use a computer or smart phone, how do I access help
- The PATCHS portal is designed to be easy for patients to use, and more convenient than calling on the phone. However we recognise that some people may not be able to do this either because they find computers difficult to use or because of a disability for example. We have several options if this applies to you.
- For these people you can still contact the surgery via telephone and by choosing option 1 you can submit a request using our dedicated automated ptachs telephone assistant
- contact the surgery via telephone and a receptionist can complete the PATCHS request form for you
- a carer or relative can complete the online form on your behalf
- We hope that by the vast majority of people completing the requests online, this should reduce phone waiting times for those people unable to do this.
The PATCHS help/support portal has lots of information including FAQs to help you if you are having any problems or want to know more.
Patients – PATCHS Support