"Prescription"

Dear Patient

At this moment in time my only response to the criticism we are receiving is to offer my sincerest apologies and also to explain why we are experiencing some difficulties.

I do not offer the explanation as a way of dismissing the criticism but simply that you might understand that we are aware of the situation and actively working towards improving things.

We have, as you are all aware merged with our neighbouring practice and this has brought some challenges for both sites as we have had to merge our data bases and also telephone systems and staff.

The telephone systems have not been without problems and have taken a great deal of time and effort to resolve the issues as they have arisen, and to keep some level of service open.

On top of that we have experienced staffing issues due to some serious unexpected sickness/absences of staff.

These things have left us very short staffed and therefore the response of staff to telephone answering we know has not been to the standard it should be.

In order to rectify these issues we have recruited more staff, and hopefully started to streamline the services we offer and the way we work.

We are extremely sorry for any dissatisfaction and would like to assure you that this is not how we want to present our organisation.

We have a wonderful skill mix within the practice and a very caring team of clinicians.

All members of the team really do want to make a difference to patients’ lives and offer an excellent service.

We hope that you will give us a very short time to have all our new staff trained in their respective roles and hopefully you will see a great improvement.

We would like to thank you for your understanding and to thank the patients that have offered us their support during this transition period.

Your kind words when you have come into the surgery have meant a great deal to us and made the job worthwhile.

Kindest regards

Jean Waddington

Practice manager