Doctor doctor

“I cant come today, I’m sick”

“BOO YOU WHOREE”

That wonderfully poignant Shakespearean quote nicely sets me up to share my annoyance with you lovely people because I’m 98% sure you’ve all experienced this too and it’s most frustrating.

Let me start at the beginning

(A very good place to start according to Julie Andrews and she is a goddess so who can argue with her)

I have an underactive thyroid wah wah woe is me, but I need more tablets so I don’t fall asleep and wake up in 12 years. I therefore need a doctors appointment. Sounds simple yeah? Welcome to the hardest trial in the known human world. Trying to get a doctors appointment in my small Hampshire village is like trying to find a Justin Beiber record in my collection…..aka impossible. So it got me thinking…what if I was really sick? What would I do? If its an emergency I could go sit in A&E for 8 hours but what if its not an emergency? But what if its still serious….what are you supposed to do if you can’t get an appointment to get that lump checked out while everyone with a sniffle sits, spluttering but not dying, in front of you in the queue.

Now this by no means an attack on the doctors or surgeries themselves. Legally they can’t turn away new patients and so their books get swollen and overrun and they can’t do anything about it. This isn’t really a rant about immigration either. Yeah sure there’s too many people in the country but who am I to judge people moving here? I’m half irish for goodness sake. I’m not even moaning about the NHS, its 100% better than us all having private insurance and not getting picked up off the curb when we’re having a heartattack because we don’t have our insurance card with us. This is me moaning about the government not prioritising HEALTH. Like seriously? What else have we got if not our health. Its the one thing that rules us all and has the ability to cut down anyone, regardless of age, race or gender. Most importantly regardless of wealth. Sure there’s private healthcare but only 11% (ish) of people in the UK have access to in in some shape or form. So what about that 89% of the population who relies upon our local GP? Those poor doctors and nurses who are working constantly and still no where near reaching the amount of people who need help? There’s gotta be another way.

There is. People with a cold, go to a chemist. Make chemists more of a consultation service as well as a retail outlet and enable them to deal with minor issues that a couple of tablets will solve without much inspection, like colds and migranes. And make sure people know they can go to the chemist for that kinds stuff?!! BECAUSE YOU CAN! There’s no need to sit in the waiting room of a doctors, making everyone else sick, just to be told you need rest, fluids and some non-prescription sinus relief tablets. Jeeeeez if I had a pound for every time I got sicker from going to the doctors I would almost be able to pay off my student loan.

Okay so I can live with waiting a bit longer for an appointment. I’m not gonna die, I’m just not going to feel good. And I’m just going to be grumpy and frustrated. I can buy some vitamins or something to try and boost myself up. But what about people who have nothing and their only access to any form of medicine or healthcare is from the doctors? These are the people who are most vulnerable and it sucks that they may end up with a chronic problem because they weren’t able to get seen in time to catch it early.

And when I start thinking of that, I start thinking of homelessness and I get myself all worked up about all these issues that I really want to help with but I feel helpless about. Gah, emotional and moral dilemmas from an olive who was originally just moaning about being on hold for ages to the doctors and by the time I got through all the appointments were gone.. Now its taken a whole new level and its getting too deep and I can’t order my thoughts so I’m going to sign off while I still have a semi-functioning brain.

Basically from reading this, if you decide NOT to go to the doctors next time you have a cold and try the chemist first and see how that works out for you, well then this post has worked a bit. And avoid standing outside in minimal clothes when its raining or you know, stuff that makes you ill. PLUS It would be especially nice if everyone that lived in my area read this and temporarily didn’t book any appointments so I could get one but yaknow, reach for the moon and I’ll at least hit a star.

 

Ciao for now bellas, keep healthy.

Peace out

O

P.S I didn’t have a feature photo that had anything to do with being sick so I figured if your head is partially made of toast then you probably have some sort of disease and if you’re a human who wants to eat a partial human piece of toast then you’ll also have a problem so that’s why it’s there. Nothing weird or anything….just logic.