Online GP’s, is this the future?
Are you sick and tired of not being able to see your GP when you need or even want to? Are we to believe the media? Are complaints about seeing a Doctor increasing? Have you ever had a problem getting to see a GP out of hours?
I wonder who is going to take the bull by the horns and look to go all out to provide an online GP service that is functional?
Is it even feasible for this ever to happen? Have you ever used NHS Direct? If yes, did you find the service to be of use? Personally speaking when I have contacted NHS Direct the end result has been exactly the same. The advice has been either phone your GP’s out of hours service or get down to Accident and Emergency! So at that stage is there any point getting in contact with NHS Direct? Could the money that is being pumped into this system not be used providing a better quality emergency Doctor surgery throughout the UK?
Again, personally speaking (I may regret typing this) my local doctors surgery is on the ball; quite typically I can get a Doctors appointment on the day I require and I have always found the ‘out of hours’ emergency practice pretty accessible.
On the flip side there are many tales of woe from many disgruntled people who have issues getting through to their Doctor, let alone getting an appointment.
Would you be willing to pay a monthly subscription to a private GP service where you knew you would get seen on the same day at a time to suit you? Would you also be willing to pay for an appointment to see a private GP?
Let’s say the monthly subscription was £10 and an appointment was £30, one appointment a month would cost less than the full subscription package for Sky. Here lies the problem, we are all happy to have Sky TV, we are happy to pay over the odds for this service because it offers us choice. Yet we all still have to pay a TV licence fee, so why not do the same for a private GP service? By default we all pay for the basic service, so why not pay a little more for an enhanced service?
Is a doctor able to diagnose someone online? If NHS Direct can do it over the telephone why can a doctor not offer this service. Sites such as The Online Clinic can offer drugs such as Viagra, Cialis, Xenical and Acomplia online without face to face consultation so why not extend this further?
I believe we have the technology to offer this service. I wrote about MyRepeats the other day and how this online repeat prescription could revolutionise the routine of thousands of people who rely on repeat prescriptions. How many of us have laptops with web-cams and a wireless network? The laptop could be taken to the patients room if for example they were bed bound. A GP would have visual access to the patient.
If a private GP wanted to prescribe a drug the system is in place to do so with MyRepeats; a patient would know their prescription would be ready for collection within minutes of the consultation being completed. The patient would indicate to the GP if they wanted to collect the prescription from a local pharmacy or arrange to have the prescription delivered free of charge.
The NHS looks as though it is going to explode at any time, I wonder how long it is before my vision becomes reality?