At Ship Street Surgery we are committed to ensuring everyone is treated with respect and dignity including all patients, their families, carers and our practice team.
In order to continue to be registered with our practice we are providing this guide to set out the type of conduct that is expected of all patients.
All patients are expected to behave in the following manner:
• To be polite and respectful towards all individuals (staff and other patients).
• To not make inappropriate or unacceptable remarks to any staff or other patients at the practice including any abusive remarks related to any individuals:
o age
o disability
o gender reassignment
o marriage or civil partnership
o pregnancy
o race
o religion or belief
o sex
o sexual orientation
• To not undertake any form of threatening abuse or violence towards any individual (staff and other patients) at the practice.
• To use our services responsibly including:
o To book routine appointments in accordance with the practice’s policy
o To request urgent appointments only for genuine urgent conditions
o To engage with any remote appointments, we may offer over the telephone (or video)/
o To attend face-to-face services where it is important to be seen in person, (including when physically able to do so, rather than requesting a home visit)
o Attend all appointments on time
o Cancel any booked appointments that are no longer required
o Request repeat prescriptions in good time, ensuring that all items are ordered together rather than in individual lots
o Use our health care professionals time in an appropriate manner e.g. do not seek appointments for minor ailments that can be self-treated in the first instance.
o To raise only genuine concerns or complaints you may have about your care or the services we provide you.
• To respect surgery premises and property.
• To attend the surgery premises for the purpose of engaging with our services.
In return, as a patient you can expect to:
• continue to access all out services, to be provided with respect, dignity and confidentiality
• to raise any concerns or complaints about your care or our services and that these will be investigated and responded to.
We would remind that all patients are free to register with a practice of their choice, as long as the practice has an open patient list for new registrations and the patient lives within the practice area.
Any patients who commit any inappropriate or unacceptable behaviours towards a GP, Practice staff, other patients or the surgery premises or property risk being removed from the practice list with 30 days’ notice. For serious cases, this notice may be 8 days. We will normally provide a warning letter which will be held on record for 12 months before issuing such a notice.
Any threatening abuse or violent incidents will not be tolerated. Any such incident will be reported to the police and will mean your immediate removal from the practice list and your care transferred to a special allocation scheme which manages violent and aggressive patients.
We invite patients to agree to the terms of this guide as a commitment to our ongoing relationship.
