When will indyref2 happen?

[Benjamin_Nevis]

1 minute ago, The_Kincardine said:

Doesn't take much to get the pair of you going.

I can't decide whether seeing you reduced to this pish is sad or funny. Maybe a bit of both. 

 

[The_Kincardine]

4 minutes ago, Day of the Lords said:

I can't decide whether seeing you reduced to this pish is sad or funny. Maybe a bit of both. 

 

I don't like the way that the Natters are going about independence and I say so.

What, actually, is your issue?

[Benjamin_Nevis]

Just now, The_Kincardine said:

I don't like the way that Malky is getting more attention on this thread

FTFY

[The_Kincardine]

Just now, Day of the Lords said:

FTFY

OK so you're just being an arse as per.  I thought you had a moment of sense but I got that wrong.

[lichtgilphead]

I'll take a few minutes to point out that....

Malky is talking shite again!

Omeprazole is available in 10 mg, 20 mg & 40 mg capsules

Only the 10 mg capsules are available over the counter, and are only supposed to be taken for a month without going to the doctor.

So, unless Malky can confirm that each and every one of his reported 12.6bn 3.59m prescriptions are for the 10 mg capsules, his claim is just not true.

Every 20 mg or 40 mg capsule provided by the National Health Service MUST be provided on prescription.

[AUFC90]

In 2006-7 prescription charges and PPC's raised £46.9 million. Introducing a zero rate cost the Scottish Government £57 million per annum back in 2006-7. Not my figures but that of the Scottish Government in an SPIC Briefing at the time that is readily available on the internet. 
In the same article those experts who rolled out the evidence to be considered said that "frivolous use of the prescribing system would cost an estimated £15m per annum in drug wastage. The response from the Scottish Government was that they believed that the "gatekeepers" were those prescribing the medicines and they expected GP's to limit wastage through improved prescribing practices - which would presumably involve more time being spent on appointments and on repeat prescriptions. 
Back then the total drugs outlay for the NHS in Scotland was £917.14m. By 2018 the figure stood at £1.3Bn - a 25% increase in 10 years! That's £247.79 per person in Scotland per annum! The most common medicine prescribed is Omeprozole used for acid reflux - a drug that can be bought over the counter at Pharmacies. 3.59m Omeprozole prescriptions were issued by GP's in 2018

The majority of the that 400 million increase will be inflation which is a LOT higher in the medical industry. You don't know very much and I'm not a doctor or one of your "experts".

[AUFC90]

Have to say the revelation that free at the point of the need prescriptions are paid by taxpayers cash has totally blown my mind.

 

Does that mean ,technically, there's tolls on the Kingston Bridge [emoji848]?

 

Discuss.

 

 

[NotThePars]

I'm sure pedantry will make all the Anglos I know paying for their prescriptions feel better while I continue to free load on the vallies.

[Malky3]

27 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

Personally, I don't want to see the reintroduction of prescription fees and there should certainly never be a payment required to see a GP and I'm not buying this idea that you want to help the poor. What you want to do is stop freebies on principle. The whole idea offends you in principle. You really should just admit that.

As for the dietary aspects, actually I agree with you. For a country with so many health problems we should almost be giving free access to local sports centres. The gains in terms of savings to the NHS would be enormous. That is certainly something I'd support.

As for student loans, I have always described them as a graduate tax. It is not a loan at all and isn't helpful to think of them that way because I think it discourages poorer people from applying for them.

So I would agree with those last two bits.

Glad to hear it. 

Just to pick you up though - I have no problem with "freebies" for those who genuinely need it but I've always thought it weird that people like me - who certainly can afford to pay for prescriptions - are able to get them for free. Whether or not charging for prescriptions makes a profit for the government is neither here nor there. The purpose of what I was exploring in that conversation was how to stop frivolous and wasteful demands on our health service. 

No doubt one of our doctors here will correct me but I seem to remember a statistic that said the average appointment time with a GP was around 7 minutes. 80 missed appointments at 7 minutes a time would be 560 minutes a week wasted where an NHS GP could be seeing patients that need them. That's just over a day's worth of appointments for one GP in that practice where instead of helping people, they are sitting round waiting on patients that haven't bothered to cancel and who aren't going to be in to see them. How many more hours per week do GP's waste writing out prescriptions for Aspirin, Paracetamol and Omeprazol that could be purchased over the counter? 

In the modern age there is no reason why an appointment couldn't be made using a debit or credit card where a charge is held on account without ever being withdrawn, and that charge is either completed when the patient fails to attend or released by the receptionist when the patient checks in. Christ, at my current GP surgery the receptionist wouldn't even need to do it - the patient checks themselves in on a tablet. 

 

[Inanimate Carbon Rod]

Missed appointments can be a thing, but its not like the doctor just taps the desk, they get on with paperwork, help with house calls, yes its a wasted surgery appointment but the time is used constructively.

[jakedee]

What happens if you don't have a bank account,or either a debit or credit card? or enough money in an account to cover this "deposit".
How long do you think it takes to write a prescription? Doctors are getting quite clever nowadays, they can write and speak to the patient at the same time.

[Malky3]

3 minutes ago, Inanimate Carbon Rod said:

Missed appointments can be a thing, but its not like the doctor just taps the desk, they get on with paperwork, help with house calls, yes its a wasted surgery appointment but the time is used constructively.

Fair enough - I had a search on the web though. That 7 minutes per appointment that I remembered isn't - apparently - accurate. GPs are supposed to set aside 15 minutes per appointment. So if there are 80 missed appointments in a week that's 20 hours a week where one GP at that practice was not seeing patients. According to ISD Scotland there were 944 GP Practices in Scotland in 2018. I know it's simplistic but assuming all of the GP practices had the same number of missed appointments as my old GP surgery did on that week where I paid attention to the figure that would mean 18,880 GP hours per week being wasted by non attendees  - and all because we have a wasteful system that allows people to book frivolous appointments. The "gatekeeper" method that the SNP expected to happen at GP surgeries clearly hasn't been and isn't working.

....and that is just as GP Practices. 

Dental practices fine patients who are late or who miss appointments so why shouldn't the Scottish NHS do the same? Why should the idea of charging to see a GP, or fining someone who hasn't turned up for their appointment so taboo? Why should our GP's be writing out prescriptions for Paracetamol and Aspirin when they cost 65p and 40p per packet at Tesco? And why should a qualified NHS doctor be telling us all that because a weeks supply of a certain type of tablet cost £10 at Boots, a patient should be encouraged to make an appointment with their GP and to get it on prescription instead?

My wife recently had sensitive teeth and having tried most brands of toothpaste she eventually spoke to her dentist about it when getting a checkup. He prescribed Duraphat 5000ppm toothpaste. Now apparently this stuff is only available on prescription anyway. She expected to pay but when she went to the chemist to pick it up she discovered she'd just got 6 large tubes of Colgate toothpaste on the Scottish taxpayer. Free prescriptions were never the right way to go. 

[Malky3]

7 minutes ago, jakedee said:

What happens if you don't have a bank account,or either a debit or credit card? or enough money in an account to cover this "deposit".
How long do you think it takes to write a prescription? Doctors are getting quite clever nowadays, they can write and speak to the patient at the same time.

Are you sure? At my last practice they struggled with searching Google or NHS 24 and talking at the same time. And it's a long time since I saw a GP that was trusted to write out a prescription. 

[carpetmonster]

Maybe the GPs just don't write you prescriptions because at this point, terminal thickery isn't treatable, so they're doing like you reckon they should and saving resource. 

[jakedee]

Thankfully, me still being here is proof that some GP's can.
My practice has a post on the wall listing missed appointments. Last month it was 56 GP apt's and 64 nurse apt's missed in December. That is a practice of 5 GP's. So you're estimate is a bit out.

[Malky3]

1 minute ago, carpetmonster said:

Maybe the GPs just don't write you prescriptions because at this point, terminal thickery isn't treatable, so they're doing like you reckon they should and saving resource. 

In Chicago do they still WRITE prescriptions? In Scotland, at least at the two practices I have been a patient of, the GP types up a prescription and prints it off. If I've wrongly assumed that GP surgeries around Scotland had made it to the 21st century I apologise. 

[Malky3]

1 minute ago, jakedee said:

Thankfully, me still being here is proof that some GP's can.
My practice has a post on the wall listing missed appointments. Last month it was 56 GP apt's and 64 nurse apt's missed in December. That is a practice of 5 GP's. So you're estimate is a bit out.

It's not an estimate - as I described earlier it was the figure that was on the wall on one day when I went in and I noticed it. Regardless though - 120 missed appointments in a month is still a ridiculously high and wasteful figure. 

[carpetmonster]

6 minutes ago, Malky3 said:

In Chicago do they still WRITE prescriptions? In Scotland, at least at the two practices I have been a patient of, the GP types up a prescription and prints it off. If I've wrongly assumed that GP surgeries around Scotland had made it to the 21st century I apologise. 

They ask you what pharmacy you use and email it over to them. You don't see it at all. 

[DAFC.]

payment required to see a GP

 

Well, that will almost certainly become a reality if we continue to be part of the bottomless kethole that is Brexit Britain. Or should I say, Brexit United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, so I’m not upsetting the thickos that think we’ll not be British after independence.

[jakedee]

Same here, you go online, tick what medication you require, wait a couple of days, then pick it up at your nominated pharmacy. Looks like the part of Scotland I live in has also moved into the 21st century.