Welcome to Kingsway Surgery:

Kingsway Surgery GP’s Will No Longer Be Prescribing Diazepam For Flying

Kingsway Surgery GP’s have concerns around using diazepam in patients who are nervous about flying are as follows:

• Diazepam is a sedative, which means it makes you sleepy, more relaxed and can significantly delay your reaction times. If there is an emergency during the flight it may impair your ability to concentrate, follow instructions and react to the situation.
• Sedative drugs can make you fall asleep, however when you do sleep it is an unnatural (non-REM) sleep. This means you won’t move around as much as during natural sleep. There is concern this can cause you to be at increased risk of developing a blood clot (DVT) in the leg or even the lung which can be dangerous. This risk is greater if your flight is greater than four hours.
• Whilst most people find sedative medications like diazepam have a relaxing effect, a small number of people can feel more agitated or even aggressive after taking it. Diazepam can also cause disinhibition and lead you to behave in a way that you would not normally.
• Prescribing guidelines doctors follow (known as the BNF), don’t recommend using benzodiazepines like diazepam in phobias. We would be acting against these guidelines if we prescribe.
• Diazepam and similar drugs are illegal in a number of countries. They may be confiscated, or you may find yourself in trouble with the police if you are carrying any on arrival.
• Diazepam stays in your system for quite a while. If your job requires you to submit to random drug testing, you may fail this having taken diazepam. We appreciate that fear of flying is very real and very frightening. A lower risk approach is to tackle this properly and hopefully permanently, with a Fear of Flying course run by the airlines and we have listed a number of these below or there are also some free online courses:
•  Easy Jet www.fearlessflyer.easyjet.com Tel: 0203 8131644
• British Airways www.flyingwithconfidence.com Tel: 01252 793250
• Virgin Tel: 01423 714900

Good advice and techniques can be found here:

• How to manage a fear of flying and flying anxiety | Patient

https://click2pharmacy.co.uk/pharmacy-first-service/

The NHS Pharmacy First scheme allows pharmacists to provide patients in England with clinical advice and suitable treatments for six common health conditions, without needing to see a GP.

This new service covers conditions including:

• Sinusitis
• Sore throat
• Infected insect bites
• Impetigo
• Shingles
• Urinary Tract Infections (UTIs)

With our online Pharmacy First Service, you can speak to one of our pharmacists, who will ask more about your symptoms and issue the best treatment. If a prescription treatment is required, you can order from our online pharmacy for delivery or we can issue a prescription for your local pharmacy.

Dear patients when you call for an appointment our reception staff will take details of your issue/problem or request. Please be advised that this information goes tot he clinical team for review, they will then contact you via SMS or patchs message to advise the next steps, depending on your initial request.

We are no longer able to facilitate patients coming up to the reception desk to book appointments on the day or hand in urine samples for testing, our staff will ask you to either contact the surgery by telephone or by patchs our eConsult service, so they can complete a triage form for the clinical team to review.

Please see below for the link to patchs :

https://patchs.ai/practice/kingsway

Home visits

If you are unable to come to the Surgery due to illness and require a home visit, please call the Surgery before 10am Monday to Friday only.

If you are mobile we request that you come into the surgery whenever possible.

Self referral to Physiotherapy

Any adult aged 18 and over who are registered with a GP in mid Essex, and has a musculoskeletal problem, can now self-refer to Provide’s Physiotherapy Service via their innovative Smart Referral Platform using this link:  > Click here to access the Provide Physiotherapy Service