Welcome to South Hermitage Surgery

We are confident that our website will provide clear and concise help and give our patients the information they require in an easy and convenient format. It has been designed with the patient’s needs at the forefront of everything, from checking surgery times to letting us know what you think of us.

Our dedicated team are here to treat those minor ailments that occur as well as providing specialist management of long-term conditions and clinics covering a wide range of healthcare issues. The technology also means you can now do a lot of things from the comfort of your home such as order a repeat prescription or cancel an appointment.

Spring Bank Holiday Closure

The practice will be closed on Monday 5th May 2025 for Bank Holiday.

We will re-open as usual on Tuesday 6th May 2025. Doors open at 8.15, phone lines open at 8.30am.

If you require assistance over the bank holiday when your GP practice is not open, please contact 111 or go online to NHS 111.

Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) vaccination programme

From 1 September 2024, those who turn 75 and those age 75 to 79 will be eligible for a free vaccine to protect them from respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).

RSV is an infectious disease of the airways and lungs. RSV infection often causes symptoms similar to a cold, including:

· cough

· sore throat

· sneezing

· a runny or blocked nose

It can also make you become wheezy or short of breath and lead to pneumonia and other life-threatening conditions. There is no specific treatment, and most infections will get better by themselves. Every year thousands of older adults need hospital care for RSV, and some of them will die. RSV can be more severe in people with medical conditions such as heart or lung disease or a weakened immune system.

RSV infection is common in young children but is most serious for small babies and for older people

Eligibility for the RSV vaccination

Everyone turning 75 years old on or after the 1 September 2024 will be offered a single dose of RSV vaccine. This is because older adults are more at risk of serious complications from RSV. You can still get the vaccine up to the day before you turn 80.

For the first year of the programme, the vaccine will also be offered to those who are already aged 75 to 79 years on 1 September 2024 as part of a catch up programme.

If you are not yet 75 the NHS will invite you for vaccination once you turn 75.

Invitations

As a Practice we will send you an SMS text message with an online appointment booking link if you’re eligible. Please promptly action the SMS text message once received. For those who don’t have mobiles, or text messages appear undelivered, we will contact you to offer the appointment.

For more information about the vaccine, side effects and the programme please visit

Winter Illness Centre returns 2024/25

A Shrewsbury-wide initiative aimed at supporting local GP practices with additional capacity during the winter is back for its second year, following last year’s success in providing approximately 6,000 extra appointments.

The service, set up by Shrewsbury Primary Care Network, aims to provide additional face-to-face appointments to reduce pressure on primary care and help to reduce the number of people visiting hospital Emergency Departments.

Starting from 4th November 2024, the Winter Illness Centre will provide additional appointments for patients experiencing respiratory symptoms, such as coughs, sore throats, or earaches, operating Monday to Friday, from 9 am to 5:30 pm.

Appointments will be made available to patients via their GP practice if appropriate, for example appointments will not be offered to patients with conditions that are chronic, complex or require ongoing care. Any patients unable to get to visit the centre will be seen in their usual practice.

Dr Charlotte Hart, Clinical Director for Shrewsbury Primary Care Network said “We are pleased to reopen the Winter Illness Center once again this year to offer extra face to face ‘on the day’ appointments, which will help to relieve some of the pressure on our GP practices this winter. Last year, the centre received positive feedback from patients, with 96% of respondents rating the service as good in our patient feedback survey.”

Please remember, if you need help and advice quickly about a medical condition, visit or call NHS111 online to find out where you need to go to get the treatment and help you need.

Online Consultation Service

We have now gone live with our new online consultation service-Patient Triage. This is a great way for you to contact our practice for non-urgent medical or admin requests. It is very simple to fill out so please do give it a go if you need to contact us.

This short online form is the quickest and simplest way for the majority of our patients to access our clinical team for assistance. Our practice phone lines remain open for anyone with accessibility needs who might find difficulty completing this form.

If you do not have access to the internet or find it difficult to use a computer or smartphone you can call reception instead, during surgery hours.

Use this for NON URGENT messages or queries, to order fit or sick notes, request GP letters or raise queries about medication. Please do not use this service to order your repeat prescriptions - use NHS App, Patient Access or POD.

Use our online consultation service (Patient Triage) for non-urgent advice only - please note the mailbox is not monitored after 2.30 pm so any urgent messages would not be seen until the next working day.

Click on "Submit new request" on the image below to create an online request:

Please do not use this online form for urgent or emergency requests. The submitted forms will only be read up until 2.30 pm weekdays. The forms will not be read at the weekends (Saturdays and Sundays) or on bank holidays. Please contact 111 during out of hours or 999 if this is an emergency.

To find out more about how to submit an online request - watch this short video by clicking on the link:

USING NHS 111 FOR MEDICAL ADVICE

For urgent medical advice, you can contact NHS 111 online or call 111 free from any phone. This service is available 24 hours a day, including Bank Holidays, and after answering a few questions you will be directed to the best place to get the medical help and advice you need. Always call 999 for life-threatening emergencies such as a stroke or heart attack.

We are currently seeing increasing demand on the NHS111 call centres leading to people repeat calling or abandoning calls.

The www.nhs.ukwebsite is designed to help those that think they need urgent care access the NHS111 service using their laptop, mobile phone or tablet. Using the website increases capacity and is welcomed by those in your communities that are comfortable and well versed in using online services. GPs have been asked to promote this service to their patients and provide the following information:

If you need urgent care, please use NHS111 online on 111.nhs.uk

If you’re unable to access the website call 111

In cases of suspected Strep A parents should check symptoms on nhs.uk/strepA

If, on checking symptoms parents still think they need help try 111.nhs.uk-if the child is under 5 they will be prompted to call the 111 number

ORDERING PRESCRIPTIONS

Due to a high volume of calls, we encourage our patients to order their prescriptions online instead of calling Prescription Ordering Direct (POD) if at all possible.

You can do this by using Patient Access or if you do not have this, you can register for the NHS App which can be activated without the need for GP input. Please follow this link for more information: https://www.nhs.uk/using-the-nhs/nhs-services/the-nhs-app/

Prescription Ordering Direct (POD) have now started an email prescription ordering service. This should hopefully reduce the volume of calls to a manageable level for their call handlers.

It is important to note that inappropriate or early requests will NOT be processed.

The email address is: shropshire.pod@nhs.net

Please ensure that you have provided ALL of the following information in your email request:-

- Registered GP Practice

- Full Name

- Date of Birth

- First Line of Address

- Name of drug, strength, dose and formulation (tablet, cream, inhaler, etc)

- Contact Number

If you are ordering on behalf of someone else, you also need to provide the following information:-

- Your name

- Your relationship to the patient

This email facility is not to be used for anything other than medication requests; any other queries will not be addressed or actioned.

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Extended Access

For more info regarding Extended Access, visit our News page or click the banner below.

SOCIAL MEDIA

We are now on Facebook and Twitter!

We will be using these channels to communicate news, NHS campaigns and other surgery info. Clicking the below links will take you directly to our pages!

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ASK DEBS!

If you're under 24, why not ask our online Agony Aunt Debs any confidential questions you might have and see if she can help you. Ask Debs or email her on deb.fitzsimmons@nhs.net.