"More than 48 hours without care"

On the evening of the 31st December I called 111 because I had developed shingles and I knew that early treatment could help prevent the long term consequences including on-going pain. I was screened by the 111 health advisor and told that I would be contacted by the doctor from the local out of hours service within 24 hours. The following morning I was called by an admin person from IC24 who initially offered me an appointment. However, I was conscious of the pressure the NHS is under and asked if a phone call would be better. They agreed that an advice call would be best be as a prescription could be sent to my local chemist. I heard nothing further from IC24 that day. I called 111 again that evening saying that it was now more than 24 hours since I had originally contacted them. They said they would contact the out of hours service again. I heard nothing further until 11pm on the 2nd January when I was called by a very harassed sounding doctor. I expressed my surprise that it had taken so long - more than 48hours - to get back to me and that they were calling so late at night. The doctor said they had come in to a 2 day backlog of calls and was working their way through them. They said that it would be a good idea for me to have a prescription for acyclovir saying that despite the delay it may still be effective. However, the doctor seemed to expect me to know the address of the nearest chemist. I was in bed at the time and didn't have access to the internet so I couldn't look it up but I assumed that the doctor would be able to do this so I gave them the name of our local village where there is a chemist and they said the prescription would be sent there. The following morning I called the chemist but they had not received a prescription, I tried other local chemists but they also had nothing so I have no idea where the prescription was sent. I believe this to be a failure of care on many levels - the delay, the lack of information given/available to me - for example I had no way of contacting IC24 directly and calls to the 111 service were difficult as they were often experiencing high call volumes, calling so late in the evening and the inability to send a prescription to the right place - I would have thought that the systems would be in place to give the nearest chemists to the patient's address. I can only hope that I don't have long term consequences as a result