Cancelling your appointment and DNAs

We have an average of between 90 and 100 missed appointments every month.  This has a direct strain and effect on our availability of appointments and wastes time of clinical staff.  It also increases waiting times for booking an appointment.

We understand that life happens and can throw unexpected things at all of us, but we kindly ask our patients to please cancel your appointment with at least 60 minutes notice so we can use your appointment for another patient who needs it. If your appointment is first thing in the morning we appreciate that 60 minutes notice is not possible, but we would expect a call to cancel close to 8am as soon as our phonelines open, so the appointment can still be given to someone else. 

When you attend late for your appointment, if it’s only a couple of minutes,  you might still be able to be seen. However, a member of the reception team will often check this with the clinician first before checking you in. It could be that even after being only a couple of minutes late, the clinician will ask you to rebook your appointment instead.

If you do not cancel your appointment at all or with less than 60 minutes notice or if you are more than a couple of minutes late to your appointment, it will go down as a DNA (Did Not Attend).  For telephone appointments, not answering the call within the prescribed time of 30 minutes either way from the actual appointment time given, will also count as a DNA.

If you have 2 DNA’s within a 6 month period, you will receive an informal warning letter, reminding you to cancel appointments in advance and that further occurrences could risk removal from the practice.
If you have a further 2 DNAs in the 12 months after the first letter, a second letter will be sent informing you that subsequent DNAs will put you at risk of being removed from our practice list.
If you miss another 2 appointments in the 12 months after the second letter the matter will be discussed at a Practice Partners meeting and would normally result in you being removed from our practice list and will require you to register with another practice. You will be informed of the outcome of the meeting by a third letter.

All DNAs will be coded into the patient’s notes on the clinical system at each non-attendance.