More than half of after-hours house calls in Australia between 2015 and 2016 were attended by trainee or unqualified doctors, it has been claimed.
An investigation by The Daily Telegraph claims 70 per cent of 1.86million after-hours calls were attended by these doctors, and many resulted in misdiagnosis.
Online reviews for the National Home Doctor Service back the claims up, with most reviewers complaining their doctor never showed – but if they did, they were mistreated or misdiagnosed.
An investigation has found 70 per cent of after-hours house calls in 2015-16 were attended by unqualified or trainee doctors
One man from NSW shared a Google review claiming one call to the service had almost cost him his life.
He said he had stomach pain consistent with appendicitis, but was brushed off by the attending GP, who told him it was simply a stomach bug, according to his post.
Five days later, he attended the hospital where he discovered he had appendicitis and a perforated appendix, which can have life threatening consequences, the man claimed.
‘I ended up staying in hospital for over five weeks with complications from the infection and lost 20kg,’ he wrote.
‘I almost lost my bowel! Do not rely on this service! Go to your preferred GP or straight to the ER If you have concerns!’
A slew of online comments reviewing the National Home Doctor Service revealed many had been misdiagnosed or mistreated – if the doctor showed up at all
Father-of-two Javier Borello also saw the worst of the home visit system when he desperately called a doctor to come and examine his children, who were suffering soaring temperatures.
He told the Daily Telegraph the doctor who came to check up on Samuel, 2, and Olivia, 3, was distracted and disinterested.
‘He was in a rush, and you could tell he wasn’t checking everything properly,’ Mr Borello said.
The western Sydney man said he was told his children would be okay, and just to keep an eye on them.
When the GP opened the next day, both youngsters were diagnosed with tonsillitis.
While the pair are now okay, Mr Borello says he would never call the service again and is concerned for anyone using it.
‘I’d be worried they’d tell people who had something more serious they were also fine,’ he said.
‘I’ll never use them again, it’s not worth it.’
One man said his young children were ignored by the call-out doctor and were later diagnosed with tonsillitis, while another said his home visit had resulted in the diagnosis of a stomach bug when he actually had appendicitis
In June, the Medicare Benefits Schedule Review Taskforce found home-visits were more commonly provided by ‘less qualified clinicians’.
Another woman, who says she works in the health field herself, claims a doctor who was called out to see her daughter was ‘shocking’ – and didn’t even have a working thermometer.
‘My child developed high temp at night, first thing [the doctor] told me was her thermometer doesn’t work,’ she wrote.
‘Isn’t that the most basic tool they need to have as a doctor?’
The woman claims the doctor was only in her home for five minutes, disinterested in her daughter’s medical history and was mostly concerned with getting a medicare form signed so she could be paid.
‘Her conclusion? Take my daughter to the GP tomorrow if I have any more questions or concerns (none of which she listened to, let alone answered),’ she wrote.
‘Or hospital if she got much worse. So basically, like you never came.
‘I’m all for this potentially great service but there needs to be better screening for the doctors employed, we are dealing with actual lives here.’