Communication at the GP

Also called GP appointments and AAC, Primary care communication

Ten minutes is not enough when every sentence takes a minute. You can ask for more, and the practice has a duty to give it.

What it is

A GP appointment is a short, dense conversation with a stranger who is under time pressure. For a person who uses AAC or has unclear speech, the standard ten minutes runs out before the actual problem is reached, and the appointment ends with the companion answering instead.

The fix is mostly administrative: longer slots, a flag on the record, a quiet room, and a doctor who knows in advance how the person communicates.

Who it can help

Anyone whose communication takes longer than speech, or needs a partner, a device or an interpreter. It matters just as much for someone with Parkinson's disease whose voice has gone quiet as for a lifelong AAC user. It matters for children too, who are routinely talked over.

It is not the route for urgent problems. If someone is seriously ill, use 111 or 999; see contacting 999.

How it works

Every GP practice in England is bound by the Accessible Information Standard. That means the practice must ask how you communicate, record it in a way that shows on screen when the record is opened, and do what the record says. A double appointment, a room away from the waiting area, a British Sign Language interpreter and a preference for email over phone are all things the standard exists to secure.

Most practices can book a double or triple slot on request. Reception will not offer it; you ask for it, and you say why. Online booking often has a free-text box, and "uses a communication aid, needs a double appointment" in that box works.

Bringing your own board matters because the practice will not have one. The person should arrive with the words they need for this visit, and a written note of the problem in one or two sentences buys the first minute back.

Getting started

Phone or email the practice this week and ask for three things to be added to the record: how the person communicates, that they need a double appointment, and how they want to be contacted. Ask for confirmation that it has been flagged.

Before the appointment, write the reason for the visit in a sentence or two, and add the pain, symptom and body words the person will need to their board. The health words and body parts entries list the ones that come up most.

On the day, ask the doctor to talk to the person, not the companion, and to wait for the answer. If the practice refuses adjustments, ask for the practice manager and use the words "Accessible Information Standard".

Where to get help

Your practice manager first, then the Integrated Care Board that commissions the practice. NHS England owns the standard and publishes it. Mencap explains annual health checks for people with a learning disability, which come with longer appointments by design. RNID covers booking interpreters and hearing loops at the surgery.