Making the most of your consultation with your GP

Making Your Appointment

• If you are registered on ManageMyHealth you can book your own appointments online 24 hours a day for non-urgent appointments. You cannot use this service for same-day appointments.
• Our appointment system works to book 15 minute appointments.
• We appreciate it if you can book your routine appointments (e.g. blood pressure monitoring and medication) well in advance, for example 2-4 weeks.
• Please ring a day or two in advance of requiring a repeat prescription. Allow 24 hours for us to process your request. This can also be done on ManageMyHealth 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
  Our Repeat Prescription Fee is $15 per script.
  Please note, most chemists are now charging a $2 fax fee.
• Sometimes it is difficult to arrange a consultation with your usual doctor on a specified day. In this situation there is usually another doctor available on that day, or you may choose to wait until a routine appointment is available.
• People with urgent problems (e.e a possible heart attack or a feverish child) will always be fitted in to see a doctor.

Your Consultation

• Prior to your consultation – we suggest that you write a list of the things you want to discuss with the doctor.
• A 15 minute consultation is for one issue. If you are organised, you can sometimes cover more than one issue in 15 minutes. It is helpful to write a list to ensure that you don’t miss anything.
  To provide a quality service, we need an adequate amount of time to discuss each issue.
  As a result, we may need to divide your list and make another appointment to talk about some of your issues.
• If you wish to cover a number of issues at one consultation, it is helpful to tell the receptionist so that she can arrange extra time for your consultation. There is usually an extra fee for an extended consultation.

Your Test Results

When you have an investigation (a blood test, urine test, xray, ultrasound), the results of these investigations can take different lengths of time to be returned to use.

Bush Road Medical Centre will ONLY contact you if your results are abnormal.  We do not  call if results are normal.

If you are registered on ManageMyHealth, you have 24/7 access to your results once the doctor has seen these.

This is a guide as to how long it will take before you should expect to hear from usm or to ring us for a result:

• Routine blood tests at Northland Pathology Lab: 1-2 days.
• X-rays at Northern X-Ray: 2 days.
• Ultrasounds, Mammogram, CT scans at Northern X-Ray: 2-3 days.
• X-rays of any type at Whangarei Base Hospital: 1 week.
• Letters from specialists at the hospital generally take at least a week to reach us.
• Cervical Smears: 1 week.
• Histology – analysis of a mole or spot which we have cut from your skin: 1 week.

Policies

Repeat Prescriptions

• Use ManageMyHealth to request your own Repeat Prescriptions.
• NOTE: When requesting a repeat prescription, it will take 24 hours to process your request.
• All prescriptions will be charged a $15 Fee except for prescriptions issued at the time of a GP consultation.
• Exceptions from Script Fees: reviewing a new prescription and/or if medication is prescribed monthly (there will be a quarterly charge for these).
• Patients that are not enrolled with Bush Road Medical Centre will not receive Repeat Prescriptions.

Did Not Attend Fee (DNA Fee)

• If you make an appointment and fail to attend this appointment OR you do not notify us within one hour prior to the appointment time, you will be charged a DNA Fee.  For all those 14 years and over, who do not attend their appointment; they will be charged a normal consult rate. For those 13 years and under; they will be charged a $10 Did Not Attend fee.
• Patients in Long Term Conditions Programs such as “Year of Care” that do not attend appointments will be charged $20.
• If you have a genuine reason for not attending, this fee may be credited back.
• If you need to cancel the appointment, please call us as we may be able to give the appointment to someone else.

Car Parking

Ambulance Car Park
There is plenty of parking right outside Bush Road Medical Centre at 6/1 Three Mile Bush Road.

Please DO NOT PARK in the Ambulance Car Park at any time. This is for emergencies and ONLY for Ambulances.

Disabled Car Parks
There are two Disabled Car Parks immediately beside the Ambulance Car Park.

Disabled Car Parks are for our patients with disabilities or the elderly to ensure they are not forced to park at unreasonable distances from the practice. Please note that Disability Stickers need to be displayed.

Comments and Suggestions

Bush Road Medical Centre welcomes feedback on our service. If you have concerns or comments about any aspect of your care, please discuss the issues initially with your doctor or nurse. We will address your concerns or suggestions as quickly as possible. Our team looks forward to providing you with a quality health service.
Feedback forms are available in the waiting area

Code of Conduct

At Bush Road Medical Centre we are committed to delivering the highest quality care to you and your family. This relies on our patients and staff communicating appropriately and developing a therapeutic relationship. We pride ourselves on making our environment safe and secure and where we treat each other with honesty, dignity and respect.

Bush Road has adopted a policy of Zero Tolerance to abuse either face-to-face or over the phone, harassment, threatening behavior or inappropriate physical contact or any other conduct that is found to be intimidating or otherwise creates an offensive or hostile environment.

Complaints

Bush Road medical Centre respects the right of patients to complain if our services are not up to standard. If you have an issue, tell a member of staff and/or fill in a Complaints Form (held at Reception).

Our Process is as follows:

Step 1

Our Practice Manager is our Complaints Officer. Our Complaints Officer receives and investigates all complaints and will follow through on a Complaint/Incident Report which has been filled in by the staff/patient taking the complaint. The Complaints Officer will then proceed and verbally communicate with the patient and staff member involved.
Step 2

In investigating the incident/complaint the aim is to achieve a mutually satisfactory conclusion and to ensure the situation does not arise again.

If a patient feels Bush Road Medical Centre is not dealing adequately with the Incident/Complaint they have the right to approach the Health & Disability Advocacy Northland on (09) 430 0166.

All Incidents and Complaints are kept on file.