Home visits by GPs

Some of the circumstances when GPs visit their patient at home include:

• When they're confined due to illness or disability
• When urgent treatment could be administered more quickly by visiting them

If there's one thing guaranteed to make a doctor angry it's asking for a home visit when it's not medically necessary. Worse still is being out when the doctor arrives at your home as you've no reason to be visited at home if you are able to go out. This kind of behaviour will seriously damage the relationship you may have had with your doctor and will take time to mend.

It's well documented that there's a surge in requests for medical advice the moment sporting events or popular TV programmes have finished. It may sound unbelievable, but it happens.

People also demand home visits for selfish reasons. They don't want to miss something on TV, they don't have a car, don’t want to pay for a bus or taxi, or (to quote a colleague's experience) they don't have time to come to the surgery because they're going on holiday and haven't finished packing yet.

If these are the sort of reasons why you want your GP to visit, don't be surprised if they say no. You don't have an automatic right to a home visit. Doctors are only required to consider visiting a patient at home for medical reasons, not social ones or for your convenience.

Time pressures

In the time it takes to see one person at home, your GP could see between two and four patients at the surgery. Wasting time on unnecessary home visits can delay someone else getting the (sometimes life-saving) treatment they need. If you need certain tests these may need to be done in the surgery anyway.

In the past, GPs were able to wander around their patch dropping in on patients as they liked. Sadly, pressures of time and more patients needing attention means this is usually no longer possible. If your GP is to meet the Government's target of seeing you in the surgery within 48 hours of your request, you'll have to help your GP too.

What to do

If you call to request a home visit, your GP will probably phone you back to find out more about your problem before deciding:

• Whether the visit is necessary
• Whether other professionals such as the district nurse may be more appropriate to visit
• Whether you need to come to the surgery for tests or even go straight to the hospital

Be prepared to answer questions such as:

• How long you have had the problem
• What treatments have you already tried
• Where's the pain

It may be that a home visit isn't the best course of action. It may be suggested that you go to casualty instead or that you get a medicine from the pharmacist.

If a home visit is necessary, however, you'll get one. While waiting for the doctor, make sure your phone line is kept free - and if you feel better or decide you are well enough to go out, let the doctor know so you don't waste their time.

If a doctor can't get a response when they arrive they may be worried that you have worsened and you're unconscious inside - and you may return to find your front door has been broken down by the police.