Riverside Health Centre – which clinic?
Below is a guide to help you decide which clinic to book into. The list doesn’t cover every situation, so if you are still not sure which clinic to ask for, please talk to the receptionist, who will be able to help.
Doctors’ appointments
Doctors’ appointments are for immediate medical problems and medical reviews. The reviews may be for medication or following a previous consultation with any of the GPs or other health professional. We ask that for continuity you do not switch between clinicians relating to the same problem.
Nurse appointments
Nurse appointments are for dressings, injections and cervical smears. It is also appropriate to see them for contraceptive pill and HRT checks, asthma and COPD reviews and diabetic reviews.
Provided you meet our criteria of single destination countries with at least 8 weeks notice prior to travel, they also are responsible for organising travel vaccinations which are available on the NHS. Please complete a Travel Health Form and one of the nurses will contact you. If you require malaria medication, you will need to see the doctor for this specifically.
Nurse practitioner appointments
Mr John Buckley is our nurse practitioner, he is able to prescribe, refer and consults patients of all ages. Prior to joining our practice he was an experienced community matron with extensive experience of the locality. He works in collaboration with the GPs and is able to diagnose and treat acute illnesses and infections.
Baby clinics
Baby Clinic runs every Wednesday and Friday from 1:30pm to 3:00pm (by appointment only) and is for all childhood immunisations, baby and pre-school checks and mother’s post-natal checks for mums. It is staffed by a doctor and a nurse. Please note that first baby immunisations are administered after the baby is 8 weeks and we combine this appointment with the mothers post-natal check.
For the purposes of clarifying parental consent, we also request sight of the child’s birth certificate.
Phlebotomy (blood taking)
Our phlebotomy clinics run from 8am to 11am, Monday to Friday. Our samples are collected by hospital couriers at agreed times, so any specimens destined for the laboratory need to be with us by 14:00. We are happy to do all blood tests here, whether ordered by our doctors and nurses or by hospital consultants.
We are unable to take a blood sample without the accompanying paperwork, normally provided by the clinician or consultant.
Smear tests
Smears tests are available to book at one Surgery or one of our Extended Access sites on a Saturday. Please ask the receptionist to organise an appointment or submit a request through Anima.
Specialist Social prescriber
You can ask any of our staff to make referrals to the Specialist Social prescriber:
The role of the SSP is to facilitate people to access social care, welfare benefits and self-help support to help them maintain their independence at home.
Special social prescribers are there to help you. Among their key roles are:
- To listen to patients, carers and their families.
- To provide advice, support, information and assistance in obtaining services from other agencies and where appropriate, make initial contact on the patients behalf.
- Provide assistance in particular to carers of patients with dementia.
- To help with the completion of welfare benefit claims forms.
- To provide assessment of needs for Telecare equipment and services in the patients home.