Dr Brent Tipping Contact Details

Dr Brent Tipping is a physician specialising in geriatric medicine, consulting from Parktown in Johannesburg. Geriatric medicine is a small subspecialty in South Africa, so a practice that offers comprehensive geriatric assessment is worth knowing about, and there are things to bring that a general appointment would not require.

Official contact channels

Both numbers are published against the practice and neither is marked as a fax. No email address is published for the rooms, so telephone first and arrange in writing from there. Note that the rooms in Parktown and the hospital where he admits are separate places, so a consultation and an admission will not be at the same address.

What this organisation provides

The listed core competencies are dementia, falls, cognitive impairment, osteoporosis, comprehensive geriatric assessment and management, and acute in-patient geriatric medicine. The published qualifications are an MBChB from the University of Cape Town in 1997, an FCP from the Colleges of Medicine of South Africa in 2004, and a Certificate in Geriatric Medicine from the Colleges of Medicine in 2006.

The HPCSA registration number is MP0694819 and the practice number is 0180070230014. The first lets you confirm registration on the Health Professions Council register; the second is what a medical scheme needs in order to authorise and pay.

Address and operating information

Two things make a geriatric appointment different from an ordinary one, and both are worth preparing. Bring every medicine the patient actually takes, in the containers, including anything bought over the counter, any supplement and any traditional remedy. Older patients frequently take medicines prescribed by several different doctors who are unaware of one another, and identifying that is a large part of what the assessment is for. A written list is not a substitute for the boxes.

Bring somebody who knows the patient well. Where cognitive impairment or dementia is the question, the patient may not be able to give a reliable history of their own symptoms, and an account from a family member or carer of what has changed and over what period is often the most useful information in the room. Note dates and specific incidents rather than general impressions, and mention falls even if they seemed minor.

Support and escalation routes

Dementia and Alzheimer disease are on the Chronic Disease List in the sense that treatment may qualify for Prescribed Minimum Benefit cover, and a comprehensive assessment may be funded where it is diagnostic rather than screening, so ask the scheme in advance and get the procedure codes from the rooms. Where an older person needs frail care or a nursing home, that is generally not a medical scheme benefit at all and is paid privately, which is a distinction families often discover too late.

There is one escalation route specific to older patients. The Older Persons Act creates protections against the abuse of an older person, including financial abuse and neglect, and abuse is reportable to the Department of Social Development, which maintains a register. That is a separate channel from a clinical complaint. For clinical care or professional conduct, the Health Professions Council of South Africa is the regulator, quoting the registration number above. For the hospital as a facility, the Office of Health Standards Compliance applies, with the Health Ombud for serious matters, and a dispute about what a scheme paid goes to the scheme and then to the Council for Medical Schemes.

Sources

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