APPOINTMENTS
Our Appointment System
Our phone lines are open for ALL non-urgent and urgent appointments at 8am. We have a Triage GP on duty for both morning and afternoon clinics who deal with acute emergencies only. The rest of our GPs (Partners, Salaried and Locums) who are on duty on that day are for routine appointments so please do not be concerned that by calling at 8am you will be taking an urgent appointment.
Our reception staff are trained and have a signposting toolkit on their screens to ask certain questions about patient symptoms in order to ensure that patients receive the most appropriate medical care from the most appropriate clinician. You may not need to see a GP, it might be more appropriate to see a nurse, healthcare assistant, pharmacist, physiotherapist, optician etc.
You will experience a wait in a queue but please hold on and speak to a receptionist so that they can direct your care. If you do need to see or speak to a GP on a routine matter but our appointments are fully booked, we will help direct you appropriately and will advise you to try again the next day.
If you are offered a telephone appointment, you will be booked in to a 10 minute appointment time slot, however, we cannot guarantee that the GP will call at that exact time. We will often give you a window of a couple of hours, either a morning or afternoon clinic. If you need to speak to a GP before a specific time then we will do our best to accommodate your request. For a face to face appointment, you will be given your 10 minute time slot, but again, the GP might be running late and you may have to wait.
We understand that sometimes calling at 8am is difficult to do so we have some appointments set aside to book online at 7pm each night if you are registered with our online services. We also have an online consult service through our website, which lets you request treatment, sick notes, GP letters and test results.
We do not have the capacity to offer pre-booked appointments, the ones that we do have are used for GP follow ups and these are still often weeks in advance.
How to Make an Appointment
All surgeries are held by appointment. To book an appointment please telephone 01435 864999 between 8 a.m. and 6:30 p.m.
Please do not come to the surgery to book a GP appointment
How to Cancel an Appointment
If you have booked an appointment with a doctor, nurse, or other member of staff, it is really important that you let us know if you no longer need the appointment so that someone else can use it. You can do this in the following manner:
- By Phone: 01435 864 999
- In person: call into the surgery and let the receptionist know in person.
- By Internet - see our Appointment booking page
How to See the Doctor of Your Choice - High Street
Surgeries are held every weekday morning and afternoon. Surgery times are generally from 8.30 to 11.20 a.m. and 2.30 to 5.00 p.m, but this does depend on the individual GPs. These are based on 10 minute appointment slots.
Most of the appointments can be booked on the day but some are available for pre-booking up to two weeks in advance.
When requesting an appointment you may be asked if the nurse could help you. Our nurses are specially trained to deal with a range of day-to-day illnesses.
All patients registered at the High Street will continue to be seen at the High Street, although you may be asked to attend the Firs for a blood test or an appointment at the Heathfield Community Centre for the midwife.
Sometimes the named doctor may not be available at a particular surgery session. When this happens, the surgery session will be run, but with another doctor in attendance.
Extended Hours
In addition to our core hours we offer extended hours appointments. These appointments will be available either at the Firs or at the High Street Surgeries on Wednesday 6.30 pm – 8 pm and Tuesday and Thursday mornings from 7-8 am.
You will be offered an appointment for the Surgery where you are registered. These appointments will be pre-booked. The Surgery will not open for general enquiries or other services, nor will the telephone lines be open.
