Home visits by a GP are reserved for the following patients:
- Permanently housebound
- Terminally ill
- Temporarily severely ill patient or one who cannot be mobilised
Please help your doctor by making your request for a visit before 10 am whenever possible. This helps the duty doctor to allocate visits appropriately in the morning to all the doctors available that day. This means that doctors can plan their day and agree a mutual time to see you.
As a home visit takes a minimum of 30 minutes the earlier in the day you request a visit the easier it will be for us to facilitate your request.
Home visits are time consuming and unless a physical examination is really necessary your GP may be able to deal with the issue just as well by giving advice or arranging a prescription. We can now also arrange a video call, or you may be asked to send a photo of the problem, providing it is not an intimate area of the body.
It is usually better where at all possible to see a GP at the surgery as we will have access to your full medical records on the computer as well as better facilities to examine and treat you.
Babies and children will always be expected to be brought to the surgery. We cannot perform a home visit for reasons of convenience, lack of transport or lack of funds to pay for transport.
If a GP sends a prescription to a pharmacy, it is the responsibility of the patient to arrange for any medication to be collected. Pharmacies are also under pressure and cannot usually deliver acute one-off prescriptions unless it coincides with your normal monthly delivery.
No patient in urgent need of a visit for medical reasons will be refused but we appreciate your consideration for planning for routine visits.