Dr Anna Crown 2017-02-26 Person 1 5 0

I have never written a review of a doctor before - I am in fact opposed in principal to the idea of subjecting hard-working, much maligned NHS doctors to tripadvisor style reviews. It seems unfair that anyone with a grievance can come on here and tarnish reputations without the doctor having a right reply. The fact that I am doing so none the less is because I feel a genuine responsibility to do all I can to ensure other patients do not have to go through the distressing, tear-inducing experiences I have had with Dr Anna Crown ever since I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism. Firstly, I have to echo what two previous negative respondents have said, in that I have never had an NHS doctor or nurse who has expressed so little compassion or given so little attention. I can confirm that Dr Crown does indeed spend our entire rushed, five minute consultation typing into her computer, only glancing up now and then and not making eye contact. I have to wait five months for these brief encounters - she deals with me so quickly, invariably I find myself back out onto the street again before I know it, having asked barely any of the questions I came in with. Dr Crown seems totally bored, like she has far more important things to be doing. She gives me the feeling that she is retiring soon - that she's seeing out her 'tour of duty' and most of her mind is focussed on what she'd rather be doing instead. Despite the distress my Graves disease has caused me, she makes me feel as if I have a minor complaint, and she patronises me. After living with my illness for two years, I know what my blood test results mean. But she does not allow me to access the numbers that allow me to chart my progress, forcing me to wait days for her to give my results 10 seconds of her attention before communicating her recommendation - without sharing with me those numbers, as if I'm a child who can't be trusted. There is no way it seems to communicate with her outside the five minute consultations. She appears to surround herself with gatekeepers who are instructed to keep patients away from her. Which leads me to my most serious complaint of all. For the first time in my life, I missed an NHS appointment, having written the wrong date in my diary. My mistake, and I felt bad about it. But what happened next is so distressing. Two days later I received a letter saying I had been struck off Dr Crown's list, and would have to go back to my GP to be referred once again should I wish to be seen again - thus facing a four or five month wait for my next appointment. This happened right at the time I was asked to come off the drugs I've been taking to control my condition - the very time when I need close monitoring the most. I tried to reach out to Dr Crown to explain that waiting five months at this time was not medically safe, but her 'gatekeepers' did not let me speak, email or write to her. Instead, Dr Crown has (i have been informed by a member of the appointment staff) written to my GP, stating that my last blood test results are good and that therefore I can be discharged. She made this decision without any consultation with me, and in doing so, has made a dire assumption that has left me in a dreadful situation. Because I haven't been able to communicate with her, and she has not consulted with me, she cannot know that the reason my bloods were fine is that I decided not to come off my medication when planned as I was concerned from the symptoms I was feeling that my thyroid levels were too high. She had assumed without checking with me that the results were indicative of my levels being normal after a month free from medication. That's simple not the case - and there is no way I am able to communicate this with her. Thus, I find myself having gone two weeks without medication, with no consulatent looking out for me, and facing four months without any support, during which time there is a very high risk I will become hyperthyroid again - and go through the total nightmare that led to me being sent to Dr Anna Crown in the first place. It is in my view medically negligent of Dr Crown to discharge me without asking me the circumstances of my blood test or consulting with me in any way. But it is unsurprising that she would do this - it looks to me as if acting quickly with little thought and little concern for the patient is her modus operandi. Please, if you are given a choice, do not use Dr Crown as your consultant. The wonderful nurses who help you on arrival at the endocrinology department are warm and compassionate and caring and woefully underpaid - everything she is not, or at least, has not been with me.