"Appointment system"

First I want to say that the care I have received from the doctors and nurses at Bass Coast Health has been excellent. I can find no fault with the care.

But with scheduling and staff, I have an issue. I saw a specialist at the clinic last month and was referred for another appointment in 4 weeks. On that day, the scheduling system was down due to an impending upgrade and the staff informed me they would send me a text with my appointment time the following week. I received a text on two days later and replied, confirming the appointment for late this month. I heard nothing further from the clinic and assumed that all was well.

Upon arrival of this date, I was told by the staff, none of whom were in the office before the changeover to the new system, that there was no record of the appointment. I showed the text message, and they still could not find any record of the appointment. For all appearances, I felt that the staff made this seem like it was my fault, as though I was the one in the wrong and there was nothing they could do. They eventually admitted to it being a problem, acknowledging I was at least the second patient that day whose appointment had been lost in the system.

I understand the frustration of the new system, but in my opinion there can be no doubt, any failure of the system to record or retain appointments is in no way the patient's fault. What made the situation worse was they were unable to accommodate my appointment which was made for that day, I arrived on time for my scheduled appointment. I believe I should have been accommodated. I think that any failure of the system is not my emergency, it is the staff's and I believe they need to solve it to the satisfaction of the patient, not themselves.

As it stands, I have had to accept an emergency phone consult appointment, rather than an in-person appointment, with a different doctor, whom I have never seen before, and whom I cannot be sure has adequately been briefed on my situation. Also I have questions that can most likely only be answered with an in-person physical examination, meaning that a phone consult is not at all a substitute for the care I was to have received. I believe this is an example of substandard care, and by far the worst I have received at your facility. It is not my fault the appointment was not recorded correctly. I arrived on time. I showed the staff the text setting the appointment time and date. And still, I was turned away as though I was in the wrong.

I am not satisfied with the outcome of this situation and I am certainly not pleased with the suggestion, even if only implied, that somehow this is of my own making, I understand there was at least one other patient that day who had a similar situation.