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Binfield Surgery

Binfield Surgery, Wood Lane, Binfield, RG42 4EX.

Telephone 01344 286264

Newsletter September 2021

Monday, 20 September 2021

COVID Booster and Seasonal Flu Vaccines

Following the recent news from the Joint Committee on Vaccine and Immunisation (JCVI) and the government, we are now able to let you know of our plans for the COVID booster and the flu vaccinations for this winter. Due to the success of the COVID vaccination programme carried out by Berkshire Primary Care Ltd (BPC) on our behalf, we have decided they should continue to administer the vaccines and will therefore carry out the booster vaccine programme as per guidelines recently agreed. The COVID booster can be given 6 months after the previous 2nd COVID vaccine. The government has requested the vaccines (COVID and flu) to be co-administered where possible, and therefore we have agreed with BPC that they should do this for our patients. To make the process of calling patients for their vaccines more streamlined, we have agreed BPC should administer all our flu vaccines whether a booster COVID is due or not. This will mean you will attend Waitrose sports centre whether you are due one or both vaccines this year. We would normally prefer to administer the flu vaccines as a practice, as this generates much needed income for the surgery, but this year we feel things need to be done differently. We hope you can understand the decision made and will go for your vaccines to the Waitrose site when called. Thank you for helping to protect the population by doing this.

Childhood flu vaccines

We will be carrying out the childhood flu vaccines at the surgery. We will call for those patients due as soon as we have both the clinics and the vaccines.

Surgery Opening

We are planning to open the surgery doors from October 1st. The decision has been made as we are in a very different position currently than this time last year. This year, with most people vaccinated, we do not feel we need to keep everyone waiting outside. To help keep the numbers down in the waiting room, we would ask that anyone with a car in the car park register their arrival with reception either via the intercom or at the reception desk and then wait in their car. Where you do not have a car, please wait in the waiting room where there are seats available. Some seats will be blocked to maintain distancing and we would ask that they remain this way.

Please always wear a mask unless exempt, use the hand gel provided, keep your distance, queue where notified by the signs and keep to the right within the building as much as possible. All these measures will hopefully mean staff and patients following the same rules and everyone staying safer.

We will not be turning on the check in screen currently as this is seen as an unnecessary multiple person touch point. Please always check in via the intercom or at the reception desk.

We are not currently planning any changes to the appointment system. We have found the appointment demand has increased significantly over the last 18 months, and by offering a telephone in the first instance, it has enabled us to increase our appointment capacity to help manage this. Please be assured a GP will ask you to come in for a face-to-face appointment where they feel this is required.

Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS)

There is a new national service being implemented currently called the Community Pharmacy Consultation Service. This is being rolled out and we intend to start this at the beginning of October. This should also help alleviate the pressure on the appointment system. If you are calling reception, please mention if you feel you could be referred to this service. If reception offer this service, please be assured the pharmacists are very well trained to carry out these appointments. Please find some links below with details regarding the service and a frequently asked questions document.

Private GP appointments

We appreciate that we are very busy and that some patients may choose to pay for a GP consultation with a private service to attend an appointment sooner. We are happy for you to do this and to take their advice, but please do not expect us to act on all recommendations made by them. Please rest assured, appropriate action will be taken where our doctors deem it necessary.

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