Appointments

We offer a Telephone First Triage System for all doctor appointments. A clinician will call you and speak to you on the telephone first, or if suitable they may ask to change to a video consult if you are a smartphone user.

If the clinician feels that it is clinically necessary to see you then they will give you a time to come into the surgery and be seen face-to-face.

We have not stopped face-to-face appointments, they are just triaged by the clinicians first.

Appointments are for 10 minutes. We are not a walk-in centre and do not offer walk-in services.

Whilst we cannot guarantee the exact time of the call back, we can narrow it down if requested to ensure the time will be convenient, for example “after 1pm” or “at work till 4pm please call after” and the clinician will try their best to accommodate this.

The time of your appointment slot is not necessarily the time the clinician will call you. Clinicians start calling patients from 8am and continue throughout the day.

The clinician will try to contact you twice, leaving at least 20 minutes in between each attempt. If you miss both calls then unfortunately you will need to re-book your appointment.

Patients may request to speak to a particular doctor or gender of doctor, and this will be honoured whenever possible.

Sometimes a particular doctor may be unavailable for routine appointments or may already be fully booked, in which case you will be offered an appointment with an alternative clinician.

Face masks/coverings are currently still required when entering the surgery building and must be worn at all times in reception, the waiting areas, and during appointments.

Ways to make an appointment

By telephone – Lines are open from 8am.

In person – Reception opens at 8am.

Online – Online appointments are released at 9pm (night before) and 7am (morning of)*

*To gain access to online appointments, you must first register with our Online Services System.

Practice Nurses

Nurse appointments can be booked in advance and are for wounds, removal of sutures, immunisations, minor injuries, leg ulcer treatment and medication reviews for asthma, blood pressure, COPD, angina and diabetes. Nurse appointments are face-to-face unless stated otherwise by the receptionist.

Children under 5

If you have a child under 5 and have concerns, please contact the surgery for medical advice.

Emergencies take priority at all times

Sometimes appointments run later than scheduled despite the best intentions of the doctor or nurse involved, but this may be due to special unforeseeable individual needs of a particular patient or emergencies.

Please be patient as you may be in need of similar individual extra care. Our receptionists will try to keep you informed of any delays and their reasons. 

Black Country Community GP Hub

We offer evening and weekend appointments at the new Black Country Community GP Hub, which is based at Portway Family Practice.

The Hub is a collaboration between 10 local GP practices to offer more access to pre-bookable GP and Nurse appointments to all patients across the area.

Appointments are available for our patients during the following times at Portway Family Practice:

Monday - Friday - 18:30 - 20:00
Saturday - 09:00 - 12:00
Sunday - 09:00 - 11:00

Appointments can be booked by speaking to staff here at Warley Medical Centre via telephone or at reception during our normal opening hours.

If you wish to speak to staff during the above times only, for example if you wish to cancel your appointment, please call Portway Family Practice on 0121 612 3429.

Home Visits

Telephone 0121 421 8400

If you require a home visit please try to call us before 11am when the doctors are allocated their visits.

When requesting a visit the receptionist will ask who is making the request, the patient's details including a telephone number, and the reason for the visit.

Please help to provide these details as it allows the doctor to prioritise their visit rounds.

Urgent visits and visits requested after 11am will be assessed by the duty doctor for that day and they will visit or offer advice as appropriate.

Please do not make routine, non-urgent requests for visits for the same day after 11am.

Home Visit Guidelines

Medical staff can assess and treat many more patients at the surgery than on time-consuming home visits. We have the benefit of proper facilities and test equipment at the premises.

We would appreciate, therefore, home visit requests being made only when absolutely unavoidable, where the patient cannot attend surgery.

Occasionally on telephone triaging a visit request, the doctor may advise dialling 999 for an emergency ambulance rather than personally attending. This will occur when the patient's condition is considered to be potentially life threatening and delays in transfer to hospital should be avoided e.g. heart attacks, difficulty breathing or severe bleeding.

The vast majority of childhood fevers, colds, earaches, etc are suitable to bring to the surgery. There is no danger in bringing a child with a temperature outside, and indeed it may help cool them down.

Patients with rashes e.g. chicken pox, which might possibly be infectious, can be placed in an isolated room away from other patients if the receptionist is informed on arrival or by prior telephone arrangement.

Most adult complaints are best assessed at the surgery. The exceptions are the terminally ill and the truly bed-bound patient.

Please accept that it is the responsibility of the patient and not the doctors to provide suitable transport to the surgery.