Medicals in Scotland - where?

[Guest Claire]

Hi,

 

Can anyone tell me where is reasonable priced to have medicals completed in Scotland?

 

Thanks

Claire

[Guest diesel tech]

Hiya Claire, we had our xrays at Nuffield Hospital and for the medicals we went through to I think Bonnyrigg, they were the cheapest back then.

 

Good Luck

 

Where in Glasgow are you?

[Guest Claire]

Hiya Claire, we had our xrays at Nuffield Hospital and for the medicals we went through to I think Bonnyrigg, they were the cheapest back then.

 

Good Luck

 

Where in Glasgow are you?

 

Thanks, will check this out!

 

Were in Kingspark.... where in Glasgow where you?

 

Thanks

Claire

[Guest diesel tech]

lol, my first flat was in Kingsbridge Dr

Then Cambuslang then Adelaide

[meldrew9799]

Hi,

 

Can anyone tell me where is reasonable priced to have medicals completed in Scotland?

 

Thanks

Claire

 

 

Hi Claire

 

When I checked the panel list for doctors in scotland a couple of weeks ago only one was listed.

 

The Spire Shawfair Park Hospital in Edinburgh.

 

Alan

[Gollywobbler]

Hi Claire

 

Alan (Meldrew) is right. There used to be Panel Doctors dotted all over Scotland, including Dr Helen Bryden in Glasgow.

 

DIAC's Chief Medical Officer is a guy called Dr Paul Douglas, who is based at the Health Operations Centre in Sydney. In Oct/Nov 2009 he came to the UK for about a month, accompanied by a couple of the other MOC doctors. Between them, Dr Douglas and the other two visited every GP practice that said they wanted to continue to be Panel Doctors for DIAC. DIAC are trying to move towards an e-health system, whereby everything including chest x-rays can be recorded electronically and sent to Sydney as soon as the Panel Doctor sends them via a secure Internet thing. Getting the Panal Doctor to complete paper forms and commit them to the post is an incredible waste of time, trees and effort. Dr Douglas specified that only the practices which could do the meds, the x-rays and the blood tests all in the same place, during the same visit, would be accepted, I heard.

 

Dr Bryden is very feisty. She used to be one of DIAC's MOC doctors back in the days when the applications for most types of visas for UK-based applicants were processed in the UK and their meds were processed in the UK as well. After DIAC moved the visa processing and the related meds processing out to Australia, Dr Bryden became a Panel Doctor instead. However she practiced on her own in Glasgow and sent the applicants somewhere else to get their x-rays done. That didn't fit with Dr Douglas' new "model" so Dr Bryden was removed from the Panel early in 2010.

 

However, she is a very feisty lady. The only team of Panel Doctors in the whole of Scotland who survived this culling process were the doctors at the Spire Hospital in Edinburgh. Dr Bryden promptly arranged to spend one day a week with the Spire Hospital team, so she got herself back on to DIAC's Panel thereby.

 

When all this was going on, I asked a Registered Migration Agent in Sydney why it was all happening because a lot of the Panel Doctors in the UK were arbitrarily removed from DIAC's Panel by DIAC's choice, not their own, and they were angry, bewildered and upset, complaining that they had been sent "reasons" that didn't make sense and so on.

 

The RMA in Sydney reckoned that there are only 13 places in the whole of Australia where visa meds can be done, so people often have to travel hundreds of miles, stay overnight and so on. He said that if the number of Panel Doctors in the UK is similarly reduced and centralised, it makes the admin much easier at DIAC's own end of things and he reckoned that this was probably the real reason for the cull.

 

I live just outside Southampton and the chap who was the Panel Doctor for the Southampton area until he was culled early in 2010 is an Aussie. He'd been doing visa meds for donkey's years, the visa applicants all loved him and nobody ever complained about him in any way. Down here, the applicants went to the Southampton BUPA Hospital for the chest x-rays and then they went two miles down the road to see Dr Goodall. A day out in Southampton is not the most thrilling outing that I can think of but there is always the Titanic Museum to keep people amused between appointments.....

 

I had a long chat with Dr Goodall's practice manager because the applicants around here were very upset so I wondered whether Dr Goodall or his practice manager knew why these sudden and expensive changes had been forced onto British visa applicants? The nearest Panel Doctors to Southampton are now within spitting distance of Heathrow Airport, 70 miles away but a LOT of Scottish visa applicants who live in remote parts of the Highlands have complained that the only way they can get to Edinburgh is to drive, and that the journey takes 5 hours each way.

 

The Practice Manager said that Dr Goodall was equally upset and bewildered. He had arranged to rent a room at the local BUPA Hospital so that the visa applicants would not have to travel to two different places and he thought that the MOC doctor who had spent 2 hours with him had agreed that that would be enough to keep Dr Goodall on the Panel, but in the end DIAC just dumped him.

 

Which was a huge shame because he is an Aussie, has spent time in most places in Oz, knows a vast amount about Australia and he was interested in why people want to move to the places they choose and could make intelligent comments about their choices, since he has been to most places in Oz himself. He put all the visa applicants at their ease (including my elderly mother) and he provided brilliant value for money because he chatted to her about the place she was headed for in Oz, put her at her ease and so on. She has high blood pressure and it normally goes up if she has to have it checked by a doctor but Dr Goodall relaxed her enough to make her forget about her BP and he got a normal reading the first time he tried. He is a brilliant doctor and I've heard that Dr Bryden is as well, so it is such a shame that they have been mucked around for the sake of "improving" the Panel Doctor scheme, I feel.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[Guest The Standalofts]

Hi,

 

Can anyone tell me where is reasonable priced to have medicals completed in Scotland?

 

Thanks

Claire

 

Hi Claire

 

As above there is only the Sprire hospital in Edinburgh, they have a set price list. To give you an idea on price - we were just under £700 for 2 adults and a 3 year old.

 

Lesley

[Guest fatman]

Hi,

 

Can anyone tell me where is reasonable priced to have medicals completed in Scotland?

 

Thanks

Claire

 

Hello there!!

For Scotland its "Shawfair Private Hospital", Edinburgh.

Medicals are £290 - adults and £190 - children (expensive eh!!!?)

They are usually quite busy so best to book a few weeks in advance. When you book they send you confirmation and some forms to fill in, there are also other forms to download but they will tell you which ones.

Medicals take approx an hour : Height, weight, eyesight, blood pressure, urine, blood, chest X ray, short interview with Doc who asks you general questions, checks your eyes, listens to your chest etc and feels around stomach area...

After the blood tests have been passed the Hospital scans the Medical reports over to Australia to be passed.

Good luck with Medicals,

Graham, Janis & Sophie (Aberdeenshire, Scotland... Rain again!!!

[Guest fatman]

Hello there!!

For Scotland its "Shawfair Private Hospital", Edinburgh.

Medicals are £290 - adults and £190 - children (expensive eh!!!?)

They are usually quite busy so best to book a few weeks in advance. When you book they send you confirmation and some forms to fill in, there are also other forms to download but they will tell you which ones.

Medicals take approx an hour : Height, weight, eyesight, blood pressure, urine, blood, chest X ray, short interview with Doc who asks you general questions, checks your eyes, listens to your chest etc and feels around stomach area...

After the blood tests have been passed the Hospital scans the Medical reports over to Australia to be passed.

Good luck with Medicals,

Graham, Janis & Sophie (Aberdeenshire, Scotland... Rain again!!!

P.S. Our daughter is 12yrs (total was £775.00 for all three of us)