"Waiting time at routine appointments"

I am a regular attendee at the haematology clinic. Timings are imprecise because blood tests are taken first of all and there is a wait for the analysis results - clearly there will be occasions when more urgent requests create delays for we routine patients. I arrived at the clinic 20 mins. before my appointment time of 12.10 hrs and there was an abnormally long queue of those being sampled. My 10 minute examination did not however commence until 16.15 hrs. So, I spent 4hrs 35 mins in the clinic - spanning lunch time...needless to say this is a 'record' for me. Most patients, me included, have become used to long waits and are generally tolerant but this seems inordinate. What I do not understand is why the sampling cannot be done at a GP surgery a few days in advance of the appointment - that way the results would be available for the start of clinics and some of the log jam avoided. There may also be problems with the scheduling of appointments - if all took the allotted 10 mins ( & mine always do) then all patients present should have been seen way before I made it to the consulting room. I appreciate that some patients will require longer with the Dr but I always seem to be allocated to a junior/or locum, so somebody is able to select the 'quickies' in advance and this could be factored into the system.