Talking to your doctor

Initiating the discussion

If you say something like "I have a problem which I want to discuss with you, but I find it difficult to talk about," the GP will immediately be on your side. Another possibility is to write a few lines about your problem, take the note with you to your appointment and ask the GP to read it. Or print a page from this website and take it with you and use it as a starting point. Don't worry if talking makes you nervous or tearful - doctors are used to people being upset.

Confidentiality

You may be concerned about confidentiality. The best way of dealing with this is to ask the doctor. Say "I have a rather embarrassing/personal problem that I want to discuss with you, but I am worried about confidentiality. How confidential is our discussion? Who will see the notes you make?"

What if you don't like your doctor?

You may dislike your doctor, or you may like him/her but feel he/she would be unsympathetic to this particular problem. If you genuinely don't like your doctor, you should change. Some practices will let you change to another doctor within the practice, or will let you make all your appointments with other doctors within the practice without officially changing. Some practices don't allow this, so your only option if you don't like your doctor is to change to another practice.

If you like your doctor, but don't want to discuss this particular problem with him/her, simply say to the receptionist, "Just for this one appointment, I would like to see Dr Y instead of Dr X."

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