Home Visits are reserved for those who are most vulnerable and are unable to travel to the surgery to be seen.
We have better lighting, equipment, facilities, chaperones and access to medical notes available to aid your management in the surgery, partly for this reason we ask that you only request a home visit if the patient is too ill to attend or is housebound.
Whenever possible telephone before 10.00am and give the receptionist as much information as possible to enable the doctor to allocate priority to house calls.
A home visit may only seem like a matter of 15 minutes, but in the time it takes to travel to and see a patient, then return to the surgery, a GP could have seen 3 to 4 patients at the surgery or made 8 triage telephone calls.
Your visit may be performed by a GP other than your usual GP, this is dependant on the workload of the practice and availability of the doctors (due to illness, annual leave etc).
It does not harm children with a temperature to be brought out (they would have to go outside if they were ill enough to go to hospital), and they will not have to wait in the waiting room if you telephone the surgery before coming.
Lack of transport or convenience are not acceptable reasons for home visits. Following these guidelines will enable us to provide an efficient service for all patients.