March Newsletter
for the patients of The Roseland Surgeries
Dr Mark Stephen
Many of you will now be aware that Dr Stephen is very seriously ill and not able to return to work. A separate letter has been published, written by Dr Stephen and is available via any of the surgeries, or our website. We continue to pass on to him best wishes from patients.
Dr Laura Lomas
Dr Lomas has left us for pastures new and I am sure you will all join us in sending her our best wishes for her future endeavours.
We are pleased to confirm that we have a new GP starting with us in April, Dr Nick Marsh who will be working 3 days a week. Dr Marsh is an experienced doctor, from a local farming family and has recently worked at Lander Surgery in Truro. I am sure you will all make him feel very welcome.
Roseland Surgeries Patient Group
The next meeting of the group will be held on Wed 19th April 3.30 pm in the meeting room of the Memorial Hall, Portscatho. All welcome! Donations have continued to come in for their defibrillators which many of you will be aware are coming to the end of their shelf life and need to be replaced. We’re very grateful to everyone who has contributed so far.
Medications taking a bit longer to process
Due to issues with having medication delivered to us by our suppliers, we’re now asking patients to allow five working days for us to process your medication. We are finding that there are a number of issues with drug shortages and although we have four regular suppliers that can fulfil our orders, there is often more than one drug out of stock. We do try to let patients know where possible, but allowing another working day or so gives us some time to try and source medication from other suppliers.
If your medication request is urgent, please let us know when you contact us. If there is a problem with supply, we can make every attempt for you. If you do have a mobile number, please make sure we have this as it’s a great way to get hold of you quickly. Thank you for your co-operation.
Increase in Prescription Charges from 1st April 2023
The Dept of Health and Social Care has announced that the NHS Prescription Charges will rise from 1st April 2023 to £9.65 per item (currently £9.35 per item). A three-month prepayment certificate will be priced at £31.25 and a 12 month prepayment certificate is going to cost £111.60. If you have more than one item each month, it is worth considering a prepayment certificate as these do work out cheaper. You can purchase your prepayment certificate online here: Buy an NHS Prescription Prepayment Certificate – NHSBSA
Reduced Prescription Charges for HRT medications:
From 1st April there will be a new prepayment scheme for women on HRT. The scheme will cost £19.30 for 12 months’ worth of medication.
The guidance on how to buy the HRT prepayment certificate can be found here: HRT PPC guidance | NHSBSA and more guidance includng a list of drugs that qualify for the pre-payment scheme can be found here: Medicines covered by the HRT PPC | NHSBSA
Just to be clear – these prescription charges do not go to the surgery and are simply a direct pass through tax that goes to the government.
Updates from our Social Prescriber – Sophie
We Are Undefeatable – movement supporting people with a range of long-term health conditions to find ways to be more active. Being Undefeatable is understanding that how you feel can change from day-to-day, that everybody’s situation is unique and that moving more when you can is just as important as accepting when you can’t. They have a great website with advice to get started and ways to move: Getting Started – We Are Undefeatable
Man Down Portscatho – Man Down provides mental health peer groups for men across Cornwall – a safe, non-judgemental space to talk and connect with others. They have a new location at Gerrans Memorial Hall in Portscatho. This group started on Wednesday 1st March and will run every fortnight from 7pm to 9pm. You are not alone. Let’s keep talking about it.
Social Prescribing on Facebook – Sophie has set up a Facebook page to share useful information to support our patients for health and wellbeing. The page can be found here: Roseland Surgeries Social Prescribing | Facebook
Access to the right person at the right time
When you contact the surgery for an appointment, you’ll already be used to the receptionist asking you for a brief outline of the reason for your appointment. This is not to be nosey!! We ask questions to signpost you to the right person in the right way. An example of this might be that you have some concerns about medication that you’re taking. Your first thought might be to see the doctor – but in fact, our in-house pharmacist Jo, can help with a myriad of medication queries. Equally, you might be having some issues with your inhalers and your asthma is affected. Jess, our Senior Practice Nurse is specifically trained to manage our respiratory patients. By giving the receptionist as much information as possible, you enable us to book you in with the most appropriate person, so this saves you time (and wasted journeys) seeing someone who then might have to refer you to another clinician on another day.
These cases are a generalisation of course, but you might think you want to see a GP, when in fact you need to see a Pharmacist, a Nurse, our social prescriber etc.
Please help us to help you – we want you to see the right person at the right time.
How does the surgery work?
A recent chat with our patient group identified a need for us to go into a bit more detail with our patients about how certain processes happen……. for example, how do referrals to hospitals work?what happens if I no longer need medication that I have at home?, how does my chronic disease health check work? etc……..
So, this will be the first in a series of articles which go into a bit more detail about the process behind the scenes. We hope that you will find them informative and helpful.
How does my annual review appointment work?
If you have a chronic illness, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, asthma/COPD or heart disease, we like to review you at least once a year for a formal check up. These checks are undertaken by our Practice Nurses who are trained in the management of long term health conditions.
We have altered our recall system so that you get an invite in your birthday month and this would be for one appointment regardless of how many chronic diseases you may have. The length of the appointment is increased if you have more than one issue, so this gives the nurse ample time to complete all the check ups necessary.
Some chronic diseases require bloods to be monitored (checking things like your liver and kidney function for example, which can be affected by certain medications). The invitation letter will advise you if you require an appointment for blood to be taken, and you will be offered a separate appointment for this to be done. The blood can be taken by Jade, our Phlebotomist, or Naomi, our Healthcare Assistant. This frees up the Practice Nurses to undertake more complex appointments.
A week or so after having your blood taken, you should then have the follow up appointment with the Nurse and at this second appointment, she will go through your results along with other checks. This could involve checking your inhaler technique if you are using inhaled medications, and look at whether you might need ‘rescue’ medications for exacerbations of your asthma or COPD. It could be a check of your feet, if you are diabetic (and possibly have circulatory issues) and check your latest blood sugar results to see how well your diabetes is controlled. We will also routinely check your blood pressure.
All of these checks are undertaken with the aim to keep you well. These preventative checks are important, and a great way to nip any issues in the bud, so even if you’re feeling really well, please do keep the appointment. It’s an opportunity to see how you’re doing – and if you need anything else, the nurse can refer you on to the most appropriate person. You might, for example, have trouble with your breathing and mention to the nurse that you have an issue with your heating, or damp in the home – the nurse can refer you on to Sophie, our Social Prescriber, who can help with these issues and signpost you to the most appropriate person, before it affects your health.
If you think you have missed your invitation (and the pandemic did rather put a dent in our organising of these appointments!) please do give us a call. We can easily check if you are due, or overdue and book an appointment accordingly. We felt that if we book your routine check in your birth month, it would be an easy way of remembering, but if you’re unsure, just give us a call and we’ll do our best to accommodate you.
Nicola Davies
Practice Manager
Dr. Will Hynds MA MB BChir MRCGP DRCOG DCH
Dr. Terese Tubman BMed MRCGP DipFFP