The blood test, my story

I’m fortunate rarely to need the NHS, so when I do as this week there is so much to learn.  And it touches directly on why we can routinely make life changing efficiency gains in the order of 40%.

Where could that possibly come from in practices who tell us the whole time they are bursting, sinking, drowning or whatever hyperbole they choose?  They can only see one way out, recruiting more GPs, and they can’t recruit.

So here’s my story.  I need a blood test for schistosomiasis after swimming in Egypt, as another member of the group tested positive.  While I explain what happened, tot up in your head the waste…

Weds 27/6 I check online to book an appointment, next available is Friday 29/6, HCAs only this week, but I think, blood test, will be OK, and clearly state the reason.

Friday 29/6  Three phone calls around 8am, all of which I miss, but get a message and call back.  HCA can’t do this one, could I see nurse instead, and she’s free at 11.30.  I grumble, shorten a meeting and agree to go at 11.30. (wasn’t available to book online)

I’m on time, but she spends the next 15 minutes explaining how unusual this blood test is (me:  “but I’ve only got one kind of blood”), nips out to refer to GP.  Can’t take the blood, but GP will call me today at 4.30 to explain what needs to happen. (slot wasn’t available online)

4.30pm GP calls and spends 4 minutes explaining what the nurse told me, and that I now need to book another appt with an HCA to take the blood.  (what really creased me up was seeing the note online for my 10 minute call:  “This was a difficult pt earlier”.  Not intended for my eyes!)

Monday 2/7 I book another appt with HCA for Friday 6/7.  Today I turn up at 11.50 and the HCA takes my blood, I’m out in 4 minutes and the actual value work is done, at long last.  I was a very brave boy and got a badge.

I did everything by the book, all online as Jeremy Hunt wishes, but did you tot up all the waste?  4 receptionist phone calls, only one connected.  15  minute nurse appt, including an interruption to the GP.  10 minute GP slot, achieving nothing.

You missed something – over an hour of my time.

I can hear you whispering that this was a special case but do you know, for the patient every episode is a special case?  Other family members get a similar run around pretty much every time they need help from the GP.  Then they try going around the system, just because they are human beings, just like all the other human beings who tell me daily about their frustrations.

But have you seen how the magic works?

All we need to do is take out the waste and rework.

I’d go online with askmyGP, answer a few questions to explain exactly what I needed and send.  Looks complicated, receptionist assigns to GP who in total peace and quiet looks up the procedure in seconds and messages me to say come in for the blood test, today.  Done.

Multiply hundreds of times per week for each practice and millions of times per week for the UK.

Jeremy Hunt wants to automate the waste, creating more waste.  Andy Burnham pops up to tweet “This lazy line that the NHS is inefficient annoys me.”  That’s not lazy, it’s caring.  I counter with Don Berwick: “Efficiency is a moral imperative”

Most of us will be born, live and die cared for by the NHS.  That doesn’t make it a religion, just a jolly useful health service.  Britain has sadly become one of Europe’s most unequal nations, and the NHS does a little to level opportunities at least in one sphere of our lives.

The NHS at 70 doesn’t need reverence.  It needs principled leadership, critical friends, and no-nonsense doers with method.

Harry Longman

PS  If you’re sick of all the hearting, @jtweeterson’s blog is guaranteed to cure you.  Simply brilliant.  Sit down first.

PPS  My story above shows why our first question in Pathfinder is “What is it like to be a patient? The data we capture make that pretty clear, and it helps to focus on purpose, good preparation for the next step of eliminating the rework.