Hartshill Medical Centre Total Triage                       

As of March 2024 we have been using Total Triage to allocate our appointments. This means that instead of phoning the practice first thing in the morning, most people will fill in an online form (accessed from the homepage on the practice website at www.hartshillmedicalcentre.co.uk). The form is then reviewed by a clinician to determine the urgency of the appointment and the right place for you to be seen and by whom. This might not always mean seeing a GP, as there is now a wider NHS team including social prescribers, mental health workers and the Pharmacy First service. This system allows you to express which clinician you would like to see and allows you to tells us when you are available and how you would like to be consulted (face to face or telephone), we will do our best to follow your wishes but cannot guarantee them.

If you are not able to use the online form, you can contact reception who can complete the triage form on your behalf. Reception will be able to complete the form for you but not book an appointment, as all requests for an appointment will still need to be triaged by a clinician. If you are unable to use the online form or the telephone, you are welcome to attend the practice and we can complete the form for you in person. We have a 'quiet room' to discuss sensitive appointment requests, if needed.

To submit a request for an appointment, please click on this link

Appointments with the Nurse or Health Care Assistant will be booked in the normal way, by phoning reception. 

Patients are requested, where possible, to telephone before 10:00am if a home visit is required that day.

We would request that, apart from the genuinely housebound, all other patients attend the surgery rather than request a home visit because of the extra time home visiting takes. On average four to five patients can be seen in surgery in the time it takes to do a single house call.

All appointment requests need to be triaged by a clinician, please complete an online triage form in the usual way. If you feel that you need an urgent clinical review please contact reception who can relay your concerns to the triaging clinician. If your condition has changed since you submitted your appointment request please contact reception.

In some situations, your clinician may need to perform intimate examinations. During these, another person will be present to safeguard you and the clinician. If you require a chaperone for any other examination, please indicate this to your clinician.

If you require an interpreter during your consultation with your Doctor/Nurse, please notify our reception team who will arrange this for you.

If you cannot make your appointment, please contact the surgery to give us as much notice as possible, so we can try and give the appointment to somebody else who needs it. Failing to attend an appointment results in many appointments being lost each week.  We regularly monitor our appointment attendance and patients failing to notify the surgery will be contacted. Repeated failure to attend for an appointment, without prior notice, may result in removal from the Practice list. 

Appointments can be cancelled by ringing reception or through the NHS App.

All patients registered with Hartshill Medical Centre can access a range of pre-bookable appointments 6 days a week. This may not be at your usual practice, but at a practice that is within our ABC Primary Care Network (PCN).

We are an established teaching practice involved in Postgraduate Training for Resident Doctors (GP Registrars) and Undergraduate Teaching for Keele University Medical Students. We hope you make them welcome. 

We teach medical students within the practice. Patients are asked if they are willing to consult with a student initially and then be reviewed by a GP to ensure the correct history has been taken, examinations carried out and the care plan for the patient discussed. Seeing patients in general practice is a very important part of the student's training and we hope you are able to help. However, if you feel you would rather not see a student, an appointment will be made with an alternative clinician.

Occasionally, we may ask for your written consent for your consultation to be videotaped for teaching purposes. You are under no obligation to consent. The videos will be used for teaching purposes only and will only be seen by your Doctor and the Resident Doctor (Registrar) or Student.

Our Practice Nurses are Mentors for the training of New Smear Takers and may have other nurses under supervision at your appointment.

You can use the NHS App to– search for, book and cancel appointments at your GP surgery, and see details of your upcoming and past appointments.

Download the NHS app on the App Store or Google Play

Click here to access the NHS app on your computer