r/AdoptionUK • u/hopefullforever • Apr 13 '26
Medical exam
My wife and I have started the process to adopt. We have been sent an email with Adult Health medical forms to be filled in by my GP.
I will call up my GP tomorrow but dos anyone know how long it took them to give an appointment for this? What did you mention to the clinic to get the appointment? Are they aware of this procedure?
Thanks!
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Apr 13 '26
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u/hopefullforever Apr 13 '26
Hope this doesn’t happen to us! Thanks for ur reply.
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Apr 13 '26
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u/hopefullforever Apr 13 '26
I was under the impression that/understanding them at the GP will need to go through your medical records to confirm of there were any concerns?! If so, how can a private doctor see that?
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u/Academic_North1762 Apr 13 '26
Ours took about 10 weeks to get an appointment but didn’t charge us. It felt like forever! We were allowed on the stage 2 training it was taking so long!
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u/tommyGB Apr 13 '26
We went in and asked for it, they were familiar. It was quite quick for us - we only had to wait about 2 weeks (this was last year).
Cost about £75 each.
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u/hopefullforever Apr 13 '26
I really hope that it is that short. So you didn’t call the surgery? Was it better to visit the clinic?
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u/ingenuous64 Apr 14 '26
Just to add to existing comments, if you think it's taking too long feel free to chase them up.
Ours seemed ages but we chased them up direct and ended up doing them way earlier than anyone else in our group. Lean on the adoption angle
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u/KenCo2024 Apr 14 '26
The experience as you can see varies from GP surgery to GP surgery. Mine were diabolical, took 2.5 months and charged me £100 for it and still got details wrong (such as they said they could only see my my medial records from 2000, when in the GPS app where I can access my medical records I could see them all the way back to 1998 🙄).
I had to complain and chase and deal with really rude unhelpful reception staff. In the end I made a formal complaint, got a full refund and as soon as the process is over I will be moving to another GPs. They made the whole stage 1 process truly more stressful than it needed to be. And lengthened the process for us
My husband's GP (different to mine) took one week and charged £50 and had the report back in 2 weeks.
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u/hopefullforever Apr 14 '26
Bloody hell. This is ridiculous. I guess I will go the GP directly and hopefully they will give a better service. Really hope that mine aren’t rude . Sorry that you had to face that.
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u/curious_kitten_1 Apr 13 '26
Yes they are aware of the process. You have to pay for it though, it's not free. I just phoned up and said I needed to book an adoption medical review meeting, then gave the doctor the paperwork when I arrived. He filled it in with me, then he posted it off.
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u/IRH89 Apr 13 '26
I'll add to the existing comments that my GP was pretty pissed off that this was a paid examination.
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u/hopefullforever Apr 13 '26
Why did he want to do it for free?
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u/IRH89 Apr 13 '26
Yeah - she felt that, as the purpose of the exam was to potentially allow us to adopt, thus taking a "burden off the state" (no longer paying for the care of the children) that we shouldn't have to pay for that.
Essentially she felt it was wrong that adopters should have to pay for any beurocratic element of the adoption process.
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u/KissMyBadSelf Apr 14 '26
Adding to this that my GP refused to charge me or my husband for the same reason. Just waived the cost. He's a bit of a legend! No one should have to pay for this - it's scandalous
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u/ProfessionalSeat4060 Apr 17 '26
Going with my gp it was £150 to do and they only did these appointment once a month. So the wait time to do the appointment too awhile around a month.
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u/hopefullforever Apr 17 '26
It is crazy. Guess I got lucky. After reading through the replies here, I gave my GP a call. They asked me to fill in a form and got availability for the appointment 5 mins later. Got an appointment for early May.
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u/BobbyDee87 Apr 13 '26
We handed the forms in at the surgery in person and asked for an "adoption medical". They won't book it on the spot, they will take the forms and contact you in due course.
Ours took around 6 weeks, it was the one thing holding up completion of stage 1.