Nhs

[TWR]

If anyone misses an NHS appointment without informing the Hospital without a good reason should they be charged the £150 that it costs for a "No Show"?

[Islay]

On what basis are you pricing your 'fine'?

[TWR]

The letter in front of me.

[TWR]

I should have said, a text from the NHS

[Baldric]

Yes.

[Islay]

Well you could have explained that!! For all we know you just plucked it out of the air!!

Yes I think it's fair.

[ummmm]

I think it should depend on how long someone has had to wait for an appointment.

[Bazile]

Yes , if the appointment is one where there is a long waiting list

[TWR]

The system does get messed up because of people missing appointments Ummmm, that's why this charge should be paid.

[wolf63]

The basic concept is a good one. My doctor's surgery puts up a sign showing how many appointments are missed each month - and it's not one or two. I am at the doctor's surgery most weeks and would never not attend an appointment.

Alas I think that the admin costs of running such a scheme might be too high to make the scheme wothwhile.

[Mamyalynne]

I am contacted a week before every NHS appointment to confirm (or otherwise) my attendance.



If this scheme isn't nationwide it should be.

[TWR]

It would make the Patient think twice Wolf.

[TWR]

Same here Mam.

[ummmm]

But when you have to wait months on end for an appointment they could be easily forgotten.

My doctors email and text.

[Buenchico]

The average cost of a missed outpatient appointment to the NHS is closer to £40 (calculated by dividing the estimated total cost per year, of £225m, by the 5.6m appointments which were missed).

However the losses for some types of appointment will be far greater than for others. Telling people that they'll cost the NHS money if they fail to attend has been shown to reduce the rate of missed appointments (from 11.1% to 8.4% in the Barts trial):
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/reducing-missed-hospital-appointments-using-text-messages/a-zero-cost-way-to-reduce-missed-hospital-appointments

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/reducing-missed-hospital-appointments-using-text-messages/a-zero-cost-way-to-reduce-missed-hospital-appointments

Even so, actually charging people for missed appointments might not as effective as some might suggest. For example, someone on a very low income might initially fail to pay. Court action to get them to pay (even if the court costs are added to their debt) might be counter-productive if they're ordered to pay at, say, just £2 per week. The administrative costs of collecting such payments might end up being greater than the debt which was being recovered.

[Buenchico]

^^^ Oops! I don't know why the link got included twice! Sorry!

[bhg481]

The trouble is that missing an appointment isn't black or white. Just suppose, for example, that you have an accident on the way to the appointment; I think most people would agree that a charge wouldn't be appropriate. Now it's your partner that has the accident; do you leave them and go to the appointment or do you stay with them? (notifying the hospital wouldn't be at the forefront of your mind). You can then come up with more reasons (less important) for missing the appointment; where do you draw the line. OK, you can have an appeals system, like you do for parking fines, but then it starts getting clumsy and expensive to administer.

[Buenchico]

^^^ Good points, Bhg481.

Further, some people miss appointments (particular GP ones) simply because they feel so unwell they can't leave home. (e.g. if they've got such bad diarrhoea that they're afraid to be away from a loo for a few minutes).

[woofgang]

I would agree with fines for patient no/late shows if there were payments for appointment and procedure cancellations and extreme clinic waiting times, both for clinic appointments and once you are at the clinic. fair is fair.

[NoMercy]

Actually, a 10-minute follow up slot in outpatient clinic costs around £400 on average.

[jno]

yes, I'd love to claim cash for my lost hours in waiting rooms - it'd be even more lucrative than PPI.