"I went for a routine appointment last..."

What I liked

I went for a routine appointment last week and was kept waiting for 75 minutes AFTER my appointment time. When I was finally seen by the Consultant he didn't turn to look at me, just kept staring at his computer with his back to me. He told me something very brief which could have easily been put in a letter. Then I went for MRSA swabs.

At no time was there any explanation for the length of delay nor was there an apology for it. There were a group of us all moved to a "holding area" after we'd waited in the main waiting room over an hour.

I was not there for a pre-op or admission for surgery so I'm not sure why the swabs were necessary and the waiting time was ridiculous. Surely if the Doctor isn't going to need or accept any feedback from you then it would save time, money and effort to say it in a letter. It would get the patients far less irritated by waiting and reduce the stress on staff.

What could be improved

A simple explanation of the lengthy delays. As I say there were 6 of us all who had waited over an hour to be seen. As we got talking it emerged that all of us were waiting to go back to work.

If when we'd checked in we had been told that they were running over an hour behind schedule or when we were see there had been an apology or even acknowledgement of the fact that we had had to wait then it would not have been so bad, we could have made alternative arrangements for things that would be affected.