If selecting ‘treatment and advice from my GP’ you will be directed to complete an online form about your symptoms. You will need to confirm that you do not have any symptoms that require immediate or urgent care. Please answer questions as accurately as you canso we can find the best way to help you. Go to the Windows Start bar or the ‘ magnifying glass‘ at the bottom left of your screen and search ‘ eConsult Toolbar‘ When you call your practice asking for an appointment, the first challenge is often waiting to speak to a person. Once you manage to get through the telephone queue, the receptionist will often ask what symptoms you have or why you feel you need the appointment.

The great thing about online consultations is that they provide your GP surgery with very detailed information about what symptoms you have and the effect they are having on you. They can then decide, based on the doctors and nurses available to support you, your symptoms, and the needs of other patients, how best to help all of you. Practices manage significant numbers of patients with long term conditions (LTCs e.g. asthma, contraceptive pill review, COPD, medication review etc). These patients are required to be reviewed on a periodic basis to ensure their conditions are being managed, and that they are not deteriorating. They will have had time to look at your medical record and look into possible reasons for your symptoms and do some research if needed. They might also decide they don’t have all the information they need, so they may ask you to go for some tests before they have a good idea about what your symptoms mean. All of this is happening without you being in the same room – which means the GP or nurse is protecting your time, whilst providing you with the same care they would normally. In fact, some might argue that they are able to provide better care because they have more time and more information. This means you might get more of your GP’s time than you would in a normal 10-minute, face-to-face consultation. When you do speak to your GP, remotely or in person, this consultation should be more focussed on the next steps, such as treatment plans, as they already know why you need their help. You may receive a phone call for you to speak to a health professional at the practice, this is because you may not need a face-to-face appointment to resolve your query. This will save you from having to come into the practice.

You can find these on any eConsult PDF you have been sent. They will both be in the top right of any report. This is called triage, and triaging patients is very important when you have lots of patients asking for your help, as is the case across all of the NHS. Triage also happens in other healthcare settings, such as in A&E where you are seen based on the urgency of your illness or injury. The same needs to happen at your doctor’s – they need to understand who needs help urgently, and who can wait a little longer. If you submit your request after 3pm, your practice will respond be the end of the next working day.

An online consultation does the same thing, however, it collects more information from you than you would normally be able to provide to a receptionist. The main difference is that you are filling in this information online, instead of talking to someone over the telephone. We know some people find this less scary or embarrassing than talking to someone on the phone or in person.Your eConsult will be reviewed by your GP and if you need to be seen for a face-to-face appointment, you will be advised of this by your GP Please submit your blood pressure readings via eConsult https://bit.ly/2PUbl6n so that we can monitor your condition and advise if you need an appointment. Once you have identified your group of patients, you can now send them an invitation to complete an online review via the appropriate eConsult questionnaire. eConsult will be offline during bank holiday weekends. Occasionally you may also find that you cannot access eConsult, this usually means that all slots for the day have been taken. If this is the case, please try again on the following working day where more slots will be available. Patients that use NHS login from the practice that they are actually registered at will not be asked to confirm that this is their registered practice.

Please note: Some eConsult features such as uploading photos or review templates as part of managing a long-term condition are not currently available via the NHS App. At this point, you’ve provided your practice with information about your needs through your online consultation. They can now make a decision, based on this and what they already know about you, about what to do next. They also need to tell you what this is! You'll typically see options to ask your GP for medical advice or send a request. Online consultation providers You will be offered an appointment that day – this will either be with a GP or an Advanced Nurse Practitioner and appointments will continue to be spread throughout the day to try and give you some degree of choice of a time that suits you best. More urgent issues will generally be offered earlier appointments. You can tell your GP about your health using a smartphone, tablet or computer. The type of online consultation you have depends on your GP surgery. Many GP surgeries use a questionnaire or an online form.You should follow the same process as you currently do to identify which patients on your clinical system are due a regular review. If the doctor or nurse decides they really need to see you in person, they will suggest you come in for a face-to-face appointment. In our experience, around 4 in 5 patients can be helped without them going into the practice for an in-person consultation. Limiting face-to-face appointments to those who really need them is very important, especially during COVID-19, as people might not show any signs of being ill. Your doctors or nurse can dedicate more time to helping you

You may be asked to submit a photo with your eConsult to help us diagnose you. However, please do not include photos of intimate areas – for example genitalia or breasts.(For children under the age of 2, you can submit photos of nappy rash). See video below for further information on how to upload photos. You will be offered an appointment at a future date – this is most likely if there is a particular GP that you normally see who is not available that day to deal with your consultation. You may be offered an appointment, either on the day or for a later date. This may not be with your GP, but may be with an Advanced Nurse Practitioner or other health professional at the practice, depending on your query.

You can submit your own eConsult once you are 16 years old. If you are below 16 and wish to discuss an issue that your parents are not aware of, please phone the surgery to speak to reception. Patients using NHS login will be marked as verified on their eConsult submission, and their NHS number will appear on the eConsult report. This will also make it easier for you to match patients’ eConsults to their record. You will be presented with an alert screen that says: ‘Do you want to allow this app from an unknown publisher to make changes to your device. Select ‘Yes’ If a patient submits an eConsult on Friday, the response time will be Monday. If the patient submits and eConsult on Sunday the response time is Tuesday.