In order to improve our patient care, we recently collected feedback from our patients by giving a questionnaire to all our patients (or their carers) who attended the clinic for a face-to-face consultation over a four-week period, asking them to evaluate their experiences with our practice. This questions included aspects of the practice such as:
Access and availability – making an appointment and waiting to see a GP;
Communication and interpersonal skills of reception staff;
Interpersonal and communication skills of GPs and nurses;
Provision of information by GPs; and
Privacy and confidentiality.
We received 162 submissions.
We have now completed our analysis of the feedback and would like to share some of the significant findings.
Overall results
We found that most respondents rated our practice as “very good” or “excellent” (ie. a rating of 4 or 5 out of 5) in all but two of the areas surveyed (car parking and cost, both of which are discussed in more detail below). Results were consistently very high across all other areas.
It’s great to find that most of our patients are very satisfied with the level of health care they receive at our practice and with the service they receive from our doctors, nurses and receptionists.
Comments left by respondents were generally very positive and complimentary of our team members, and we were therefore very pleased with the results.
Ease of Parking
One aspect where we did not score as highly was for “ease of car parking”.
This was unsurprising, as we do not have off-street parking for patients, nor do we have enough off-street parking for all of our staff. Therefore, we are aware that the local streets are often quite full of cars.
Some respondents acknowledged that parking is outside of our control.
Although some patients will have no alternatives to driving, especially during times of ill-health, we ask consideration be made of the following:
Patients who live within a 15-minute walk of the practice might consider walking (or cycling) – indeed, it will sometimes be quicker than finding a car space and then walking to the practice. In addition, the number one health tip our GPs give to patients is to be more active, so walking will have the added advantage of improving your health.
We are a 2 minute walk from Gardenvale Station for patients that live near a station on the Sandringham railway line. Bus route 630 (Elwood to Monash University) stops at the station, and bus routes 604 (Gardenvale to The Alfred) and 605 (Gardenvale to Flagstaff Station) stop just over Nepean Highway, and are accessible via the footbridge. See here for a PTV’s map of Bayside public transport services, or use Journey Planner to plot a public transport trip.
If you do need to drive, we simply ask that you keep the potential parking shortage in mind and give yourself plenty of time to find a parking spot, as this will minimise the chances of you being late for your appointment, which might cause cascading delays to your doctor’s schedule. This is paricularly the case because Martin Street Village is growing - with new buildings being developed, street parking can be temporarily lost or streets closed, decreasing the number of street spaces available. Patients may find more parking available if they try one street further away from the main centre.
Martin Street is also popular for brunch and lunch. If you are driving, we suggest avoiding the lunchtime periods as street parking is busier at these times.
We do appreciate your patience and understanding with regards to parking. We hope that the rest of your experience at our practice makes up the for the inconvenience it sometimes causes.
The amount you paid for each visit to the doctor
Another aspect where we did not score as highly was for “The amount you paid for each visit to the doctor”. The average score was 3.69 out of 5, which is between “Good” and “Very Good”, so it appears most respondents were reasonably satisfied with the fees paid. However, presumably at least some respondents would prefer if we bulk billed, or if our fees were lower.
There are many reasons why we are a privately billing clinic, but in particular, it is because bulk billing would mean that we would not be able to provide our services at the very high-level of quality in modern facilities we believe we currently do. You can read more about this here, and The Age newspaper recently published an Explainer article called “Why has your doctor stopped bulk-billing?”
Some patients commented that they found our fees structure to be confusing or not transparent enough. We take these comments on board, but note that with the complexities of Medicare billing, it’s a very difficult to predict what you may be charged. We try to keep our fee structure simple, with fees based around a fixed out-of-pocket amount for the patient after receiving their Medicare rebate.
Our fees are listed clearly on our website and on signs in reception, and on the HotDoc booking platform, and reception staff are trained to let patients know what expected fees will be and the process of getting their rebate back.
Other Suggestions for Improvement
Our final question was to ask “If you could change one thing about this practice, what would you change?”.
More than half of respondents said “Nothing” or similar, many of which included some lovely compliments about the doctors, nurses and receptionists or the clinic generally.
Aside from improvements to parking and fees, we received some valuable suggestions, including:
Availability for appointments
Some respondents reported difficulty getting an appointment with their preferred doctor, or with getting an appointment at all for an urgent matter.
We do try to ensure there are sufficient on-the-day appointments reserved for all of the doctors so that patients are more likely to be able to see their preferred doctor and so that there are slots for urgent appointments, but this can be difficult to plan for.
In particular, for 6 of the past 12 months, we were renovating the clinic, which meant we had one less consulting room to use. This meant that doctors would often be booked out for several days (but for their on-the-day appointments), and that their on-the-day appointments would be quite quickly filled each day. During this time, we stopped taking on new patients to ensure we could better cope with demand from existing patients.
Now that our renovations are complete, we have more consulting rooms, an additional doctor (Dr Marni Rosenberg), and some doctors now working additional days, so we are better able to manage availability.
As the clinic gets busier with new patients again, we will look to ensure that availability continues to be managed appropriately.
Comfort and amenity of the waiting area
Some respondents felt that the waiting room could be improved - suggestions included toys for kids, a TV, a more private area for breastfeeding, and a different layout so patients aren’t facing each other so much.
We recently had a TV re-installed in the reception area. We removed our kids toys during the COVID-19 pandemic and they unfortunately remain an infection risk. If you are attending the clinic with children, please bring some toys or books to keep them entertained. We will continue to experiment with different seating layouts to see what can be improved.
We’ve also trained our receptionists to offer breastfeeding patients a private place to do so should they wish.
Conclusion
We would like to again thank everyone who participated in the questionnaire for their valuable contribution to improving our practice.
If you didn’t get a chance to give feedback, or if you would like to give further feedback, please refer to our Feedback and Complaints page.
We look forward to continuing to provide you with quality healthcare.
Justin Meyer, Practice Manager
On behalf of the GPs and staff members at North Brighton Medical