£140k a month - the huge cost to NHS of missed appointments in Southampton

Health chiefs say a huge number of people are wasting NHS time and resources by failing to turn up after asking to see a doctor or nurse.

A total of 6,300 missed appointments were recorded in Southampton in December 2015 alone.

By failing to ring up and cancel, the culprits deprived 6,300 other patients of the chance to see a GP or nurse sooner.

The survey was carried out by NHS Southampton City Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which manages the NHS money spent in the city.

The chairman, Dr Sue Robinson, said: “For me as a GP these figures are quite shocking.

"We want to work with the public to make sure people can see their GP as soon as possible so we’re trying to make it easier for people to cancel unwanted appointments.

"We’re encouraging registration for online access to the GP practice booking system. This will allow people to book and cancel appointments at the click of a button.

"We’d also love to hear from local people to understand how we can make the whole appointment process easier for them."

Chairman of Healthwatch Southampton, Harry Dymond was disappointed by the figures but said that finding patients is not the right answer and but believes naming and shaming persistent offenders should be looked at.

Mr Dymond, said:"The figures for those that do not attend GP appointments is very disappointing. Apart from the cost to the NHS, which is bad enough, the more serious effect of failing to keep an appointment is that it is depriving others from being able to book one.

The most common criticism received by Healthwatch is the length of wait for a GP appointment and failing to keep an appointment is clearly one factor. There is a shortage of GPs across the Country and it is important that patients understand and respect the importance of keeping the appointment or of cancelling if they no longer consider it necessary to see a GP.

"Healthwatch would certainly wish to see the figures for missed appointments drastically reduced but it is important to avoid a 'knee jerk' reaction.

"We are not convinced that a simple solution such a fining patients is the right answer. The administrative burden that this would cause would almost certainly mean that any benefit would be lost by additional costs. "Secondly there is a risk that some patients that really need to see a GP may not do so for fear of the fine if they fail to keep the appointment.

"A system of 'name and shame' might be considered for the more persistent offenders but the real answer is or all patients to be mindful that failing to notify the surgery that they cannot keep an appointment is wasteful of valuable NHS resources and prevents others getting a needed appointment."

Nationally 61,000 appointments are wasted every day by patients not bothering to turn up. The lost time is equivalent to a year's work for 1,300 doctors and costs the NHS more than £300 million.

GPs say many patients simply forget they have made an appointment or get better before they are due to see their doctor.

But the average appointment costs the NHS £23 and many doctors have called for patients to be fined £10 each time they fail to turn up, enabling the health service to claw back some of the cash.

Dr Robinson said: "People often suggest we should charge patients for missing their appointments but that’s really not what the NHS is all about.

"We understand that people have busy lives and we don’t want to impose penalties on people for simple human mistakes.

"But at the same time we would like to ask the public to do some quick things such as putting their appointments in a diary to minimise the chances of forgetting them.

"I know it can seem like a ten-minute appointment doesn’t matter in the great scheme of things but across the city in one month this adds up to a staggering amount of unused time.”