01 837 7315
PRACTICE POLICIES
APPOINTMENTS
At Drumcondra Medical, appointments are offered based on availability. There is a maximum number of patients each doctor can see every day. We would ask that you take the first appointment you are offered - this enables us to efficiently manage the schedule of the practice.
If you are being seen as an emergency appointment, please note that you are being squeezed into the doctor’s schedule due to the nature of your issue. As such, your appointment time may be less and you will only be able to discuss the acute problem with the doctor at that appointment. Should you wish to discuss other medical issues you may be asked to book a regular, non-urgent appointment.
Appointments are 15 minutes long. If you feel you require a longer appointment time, this can be requested at the time of booking. Patients sometimes request longer appointments to discuss issues such as mental health, stress and family planning for example. A 15 minute appointment is €60 and a longer (30 minute) appointment is €90. Please specify a longer appointment at the time of booking.
If you wish to cancel or reschedule your appointment, please get in touch with the surgery either by telephone or email as soon as possible. If you fail to attend and do not give us 24 hours notice that you will not be attending, a non-attendance fee of €30 will be applied to your account. This fee will need to be paid before another appointment is offered to you. Patients who do not attend on multiple occasions without contacting the practice to cancel, may be requested to leave the practice. If a new patient fails to turn up for their first patient appointment, it is the policy of the practice not to offer a further appointment, such is the demand for appointments. Very often there is a cancellation list of patients who are waiting to be seen.
If more than one member of the same family needs to be seen, please specify this at the time of booking.
An appointment for a blood test cannot be booked without a Doctor consultation beforehand. The only exception to this is if a patient requires blood tests in advance of a hospital appointment. In this case, patients are requested to bring the list of required tests with them.
HOUSE CALLS
House calls are available for those who are terminally ill.
TEST RESULTS
Due to the large number of patients attending the practice, it is not possible to telephone patients with their results. Unless you specifically instruct us not to, you will receive a text from the practice informing you that your test results were either satisfactory or that you should contact the practice to make a review appointment to discuss your results with the doctor.
If the results are satisfactory, you do not need to call the doctor back. If you receive a message requesting you to make an appointment to be seen, please do not worry. Often times these are situations where there are a number of small abnormalities that require a discussion with the doctor, perhaps a prescription and a follow up plan.
In all cases if you do not hear from us within 14 days please phone for your results on 01 837 7315 or contact us via email on hello@drumcondramedical.ie.
Please note, private scanning facilities will often tell patients that the results of scans will be with their GP within 48 hours. This is generally not the case. As above, the results will be conveyed to you via text message. If you do not hear from us within 14 days, please get in touch.
SICK NOTES & SOCIAL WELFARE CERTS
Patients requiring a sick note for work must attend the surgery in person and be seen by a GP prior to being certified. Sick notes are not issued without the patient being seen. The only exception to this is when patients have been an inpatient in hospital and we have received a letter from the Hospital verifying this.
If you need to extend your sick note, please contact reception and they will put the request through to the Doctor. In these situations, you will need to be seen in person.
To submit a Social Welfare Certificate we will need your PPS number and dates of sick leave. Patients do not need a Social Welfare Certificate for the first 3 days of illness as there is no Social Welfare payment for these 3 days.
Please contact reception 24 hours before your social welfare certificate is due. Social Welfare Certificates are submitted online.
TEXT & EMAIL POLICY
At Drumcondra Medical we advocate the use of text messages for appointment reminders and notification of satisfactory results. We also use text messages to remind you of your appointments. If you do not wish us to communicate with you via text message, please mention this to reception.
For those who wish, we are contactable via email for appointment requests and general queries. Please note we cannot give medical advice out over email and our emails are not monitored outside of surgery hours.
We are, of course, always willing to deal with you by telephone if that is your preference.
ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOUR POLICY
At Drumcondra Medical it is our policy to treat all of our patients with respect and courtesy. We expect the same in return to all of our staff members, including our administrative team. Any aggressive or inappropriate behaviour towards staff will result in the patient being asked to leave the practice.
COMPLAINTS PROCEDURE
At Drumcondra Medical we take patient complaints very seriously. If a patient wishes to make a complaint, they can do so confidentially either verbally or in writing to Dr Sinéad Cronin. We will make note of the complaint and come back to the patient with next steps within 48 hours. Dr Cronin will investigate the complaint to establish the facts. We then aim to resolve the issue. Records of all complaints /outcomes will be kept and discussed at a practice meeting with the aim of addressing any changes that need to be made at practice level.
CHILD PROTECTION AND SAFEGUARDING POLICY
The Drumcondra Medical policy on Child Protection and Safeguarding can be viewed here.