"Poor experience of Healthshare MSK"

I was referred to this company (commissioned by NHS North West London) by my GP for severe back pain.

It has been fraught with problems. It took months to get a phone consultation. That was a poor experience. The person on the phone was hard to understand and seemed unwilling to listen. They advised me I would need a face-to-face appointment. I had that another couple of months later.

The physio was great. She was an experienced NHS professional & I would emphasise that she was exceptional.  X Ray & MRI advised. I was told to organise the X ray myself. That took ten phone calls. Every time I called ChelWest hospital they told me they had not received the referral.

Then I tried to phone Healthshare. Their phone system is abysmal. They play loud discordant music which caused me sensory overload. It must be horrendous for people with autism. I waited several times for some considerable time only to get a recorded American voice saying "there are no agents to answer your call" then the line went dead. When I finally got someone, they were pretty awful with a habit of saying "no worries" to everything I said, which riled me as I most definitely did have worries at this stage.

The next person said 'I can only apologise' which is another no no. I advised them not to use that expression as you can ALWAYS offer a course of action.

The MRI appointment arrived - a clinic in Brentford way out of my area. I phoned to query this. The person on the phone was rude, defensive & refused to answer my question as to why I had to travel out of area given I have Long Covid & severe back pain. They kept saying "nothing to do with us. Your GP sent you to us". I advised them it was not my GP but Healthshare. They advised me "we are not Healthshare, we are Healthshare Diagnostics". It was a very simple question re accessibility since they have an excellent MRI suite in my local hospital where I had the X Ray. It was a most unpleasant conversation with someone who appeared to have no interest whatsoever in patients.

Overall I would summarise the problems as lack of professionalism, poor communication & staff attitudes, inadequate systems & staffing levels, a culture that does not seem to value patient feedback and views us as an inconvenience. Even the reception in their clinic in St Charles Hospital was unstaffed with a note up saying "we have no receptionist". A group of us simply sat there for ages wondering if we were in the right place as it looked like there was no-one around. We chatted amongst ourselves and I must say all of us were having an appalling experience.

I delivered a lot of training over the years to HCPs of different levels & I would definitely hold this company up as an example of how not to do patient-centred care. I note from reviews in various sites that these issues are being flagged up regularly over an extended period of time. This gives me the impression that if they are even interested in feedback, they are most certainly not acting upon it.