Make an appointment

Making an Appointment

Jubilee Medical Centre operates a triage system, and any request for an appointment will be passed to our GP or Advanced Nurse Practitioner for triage. Triage is a method of deciding the best course and provider of treatment for the presenting condition. The clinician will make a decision as to the most appropriate person to deal with the problem. You can request an appointment either by phoning or completing an E-Consultation.

Previously we tried to treat everyone on the day they contacted us. From October 2021, instead of dealing with everything on the same day, a clinician will look at all appointment requests as they come in and decide what is the best way to help. Sometimes this will be the same day (for urgent problems), sometimes an appointment will be offered in the next few days. The more information you can give us on the E-Consultation or when you phone up the easier it will be to get that triage right. Our receptionists will be asking a couple more questions to help collect that information. Your answers are treated confidentially just like anything you tell a doctor or nurse. All phone calls are recorded for training and monitoring purposes. 

We’ll keep you up to date about the outcome of triage, by SMS or by phone. If you can’t use a phone or E-Consultation then you can still come in to the desk to request an appointment.

For those patients who require interpreters we can arrange BSL interpreters and interpreters via telephone and face to face for a variety of languages. This can be difficult on short notice so your appointment may have to be arranged for a later date if no interpreter is available. 

E-Consultations

E-Consultations are available for non-urgent problems from 7am Monday to Friday and are switched off once we have reached the maximum capacity for this service. This is to ensure that we can maintain a safe, efficient service for all our patients.

When completing an E-Consultation please fill in the appropriate pathway for your medical problem. Each e-consult pathway is designed for one medical problem only. If you have more than one problem, please fill in a separate e-consultation for that problem so that the questions are relevant to that condition. Please only complete 1 E-Consultation per day. If you find that you are unable to complete an e-consult, this indicates that we have reached capacity for that day. They will be available again at 7am the following working day. If you do require an appointment with the surgery, please telephone our usual number.

If you are completing an E-Consultation on behalf of someone else, for example your child or someone you care for, please complete the E-Consultation under their name rather than your own.

Please note that you can submit administration requests such as requests for a private letter or a new fit note or a fit note extension but  E-Consultations are not to be submitted for routine medication.

Home Visits

If you are unable to visit the surgery, please telephone before 11.00am. Visits will usually be done between 12.00 and 4.00pm. Try to give the receptionist some idea of the problem—the doctor will ring back to clarify the request.

Please do not request an immediate visit unless you feel there is a real emergency, because of the disruption this causes to surgeries—in the time taken up by a home visit the doctor can see several patients in surgery.

Extended Access Appointments

You may be offered a triage appointment with the Extended Access team. These are GPs working alongside our own GPs to offer appointments when we are at capacity. If you are asked to be seen face to face, you may need to travel to a different surgery as it will not be possible to be seen at Jubilee when we are at full capacity.

Out of Hours

If you need an urgent visit or advice outside of normal surgery hours please telephone the normal surgery number and you will either be transferred automatically to the out of hours service or advised to call 111. You will be offered telephone advice, an appointment at a GP out of hours centre, or a visit as appropriate. Please be considerate and do not call if your problem could wait until the next day.

Other Options

Click here for information on Walk in Centres, 111 and A&E.

Could the Chemist Help?

Lots of common ailments can be managed without any need to see a health professional. Some chemists operate the ‘care at the chemist’ scheme where you can obtain advice and prescriptions regarding common ailments including:

• Coughs, colds, fever and sore throat
• Allergy, hay fever
• Conjunctivitis, cold sores, mouth ulcers
• Indigestion, constipation , diarrhoea, cystitis
• Haemorrhoids, pain, headache
• Head lice, threadworms
• Thrush, contact dermatitis, athlete’s foot, warts and verrucae

If you normally get free prescriptions these prescriptions will also be free.

Do you have a Questions about Medication or need a Medication Review?

Please ask reception to pass your query to the practice pharmacist, who will review it and make sure you get an answer. For a medication review you may need to see the practice nurse, or have a blood test or a telephone consultation. If you have been seen recently the pharmacist may be able to do the medication review by looking at your medical records. You shouldn't need an appointment for repeat medications, even if it is urgent, so please request these in the proper way so we can make the best use of our appointments. 

Phone System Upgrade

We appreciate that it has been hard to get through on the phone at times recently. Thank you for all your patience and your feedback which we have taken on board.
To address this we've now upgraded to a new phone system. You can now keep your place in the queue and get a call back from one of the reception team instead of waiting on hold. This isn't going to solve everything overnight because there is still a high level of demand, but we hope it will make a difference and we are going to keep working on improving our service. Obviously we would still encourage you to use online services and E-Consultations as much as possible to reduce the pressure on the phone lines.

Please note calls are now recorded for training and quality purposes.