It's 2010! Or 6/3 if you're using the Snellen chart. And I don't know if it's my imagination, but there seems to be a bit of snow out there. I've spent Wednesday and Thursday of this week on the phone to patients, cancelling their appointments and rebooking them for February. We did manage to get out to a couple of clinics yesterday, but very few people turned up, and to be honest, even if they're willing to brave the frozen wastes, I'm not sure it's a good idea to make patients walk home through a snow drift with dilated pupils. One shaft of sunlight and they'll be dazzled for life.

Most people have been relieved to hear that we don't expect them to haul their walking frames through a blizzard for the sake of a retinopathy screening appointment, and are only too pleased to be rebooked. But there's always one who has to be different. And I spoke to him today.

He was a chap in his 60s, and he had an appointment for tomorrow morning at a clinic 25 miles from our base. The roads between here and there are treacherous, and the decision was made first thing this morning to cancel tomorrow's appointments. Not only was it impossible for our screener to make the trip, but a number of patients had already cancelled for exactly the same reason. And they only live around the corner. Not this guy, though. He informed me on the phone that he lives four miles from the clinic, and would be walking to his appointment.

When I broke the news to him that there'd be no one there if he did, he began a lengthy rant which included the following little gems:

  • Screeners are just lazy and want to stay in bed all day.


  • If I can walk 4 miles, you should be able to drive 25.


  • The roads aren't that bad anyway.


  • It's only a bit of snow.


  • I hope the screeners won't get paid for tomorrow.


I said that if we can't get into work, we may be forced to take the day as annual leave, and he replied "Well that's some consolation I suppose". I should have added that we'll also be flogged in the street, and he might have been happy.

I mentioned this caller to my manager, and he told me that during a previous episode of bad weather, he'd spoken to a man who was outraged that we'd cancelled his appointment, and claimed that the 15 mile distance between our base and the health centre was, and I quote, "walkable". So my boss told him we were holding a clinic here, and said he was welcome to come.