HeliosCheck
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How it works

How a HeliosCheck.com consultation works, step by step

Four stages: a structured intake form, a 30–45 minute appointment with a named gynecologist, a written plan you keep, and two weeks of follow-up messaging. Here is what happens at each one, what to have ready, and what we do when a question cannot be answered on a screen.

  1. 01

    Complete the intake form

    Ten to fifteen minutes, saved as you go, read by your clinician before you meet.

  2. 02

    Meet your gynecologist

    30–45 minutes by video or phone, with the specialist matched to your question.

  3. 03

    Receive your written plan

    A plain-language summary within 24 hours, yours to keep and to forward.

  4. 04

    Follow up for 14 days

    Message the same clinician while the plan meets real life. Included in the fee.

Step one

The intake form you complete before we meet

Booking with HeliosCheck.com starts with a form rather than a call. It takes most people ten to fifteen minutes, saves as you go, and can be finished on a phone at whatever hour suits you. It asks for everything a gynecologist would otherwise spend the first third of an appointment collecting.

  • Your cycle — length, duration, heaviness, and when the pattern changed
  • Obstetric history, previous surgery, and screening or smear dates
  • Current medicines and doses, contraception, allergies and past reactions
  • Conditions that run in your family, on both sides where you know them
  • The one thing you most want answered by the end of the call

There is an upload panel for anything already on paper: ultrasound reports, blood results, histology, clinic letters, even a photograph of a prescription label. A slightly blurred phone snapshot of a real report is worth more than a remembered summary of one, so send it even if it looks untidy.

Your clinician reads the form and the documents before the appointment opens — not while you are sitting there watching. That is the whole point of it. Nothing you have written down has to be said out loud again unless you want it discussed, which matters when the history includes a loss, a termination or an experience of care that went badly.

Gynecologist reviewing a patient history in conversation before a HeliosCheck.com consultation
Calm, well-lit consulting room of the kind HeliosCheck.com clinicians consult from
Step two

Your consultation with a named specialist

The link arrives by email and by text. It opens in an ordinary browser on a laptop, tablet or phone — nothing to install, no third-party account, no waiting room. Join five minutes early and a short check tests your camera, microphone and connection so the first minutes of the appointment are not lost to the technology.

The appointment runs 30 to 45 minutes with the specialist matched to your reason for booking; you can read who they are and what each of them focuses on on our about page. It usually goes like this: a short recap of what you wrote, then a structured history that follows the thread rather than a checklist, then the part most consultations never reach — what the realistic options are, what each one costs you in side effects, monitoring or time, and which fits the life you actually have.

If your connection drops, we call the number you gave us and finish by phone — no appointment is cut short by a technical failure. If you would prefer a phone consultation from the outset, say so when you book.

What a video call cannot do is examine you. Where a speculum examination, swab, smear, scan or biopsy is needed, we say so during the appointment — see what happens next below. The rest of what we cover and the conditions we see most are set out in full elsewhere.

03

The written plan you keep

Your summary reaches your secure account within 24 hours, with an email to tell you it is there. It is written in plain language, because the person it has to work for is you.

  • What you described, in your words as well as in clinical terms
  • The working impression — and what would change it
  • Any tests requested, what each is looking for, and where to have it done
  • Treatment options with their trade-offs, not only the recommended one
  • Prescriptions where they are clinically appropriate to issue remotely
  • A paragraph written for your own doctor, ready to forward
  • The specific symptoms that should make you seek help sooner

We do not prescribe controlled drugs remotely, and we will not prescribe for something that needs examining first. Where that applies, the plan says so and tells you what to do instead. Nothing in it is a guarantee of outcome — see our medical disclaimer.

04

Fourteen days of follow-up

The fee covers 14 days of messaging with the same clinician after your appointment — not a general inbox, not a triage line. In practice it gets used for four things.

  • A result has landed and you want it interpreted properly
  • A side effect has appeared in week one and you need to know whether to stop
  • The question you thought of an hour after hanging up
  • Confirming a dose, or how something sits alongside your other medication

Replies come within one working day. This is not an urgent service; for symptoms that cannot wait, use the red-flag guidance below. At day 14 we either close the episode with a short note or, if the picture is still moving, suggest a follow-up consultation — and we will tell you plainly when we think one is unnecessary.

Before your appointment

What to have ready

None of this is compulsory, and no one is sent away for arriving without it. But the appointments that travel furthest in 45 minutes tend to be the ones where these were already on the table.

Clinical details worth digging out

  • Dates and details of your last two or three periods
  • Every medicine and supplement you take, with doses
  • Any drug allergies or past reactions
  • Results, scan reports or clinic letters from the past two years
  • A recent blood pressure reading, if you have a home monitor
  • What you have already tried, and whether it helped

For the call itself

  • A private room — or headphones, if privacy at home is difficult
  • A charged device, good light on your face, and a stable connection
  • Your main question written down, so it does not get lost
  • Somewhere to take notes, on paper or on screen
  • Someone with you, if you would rather not do this alone
  • Ten spare minutes afterwards, before your next commitment
When a screen is not enough

If you need in-person care or an urgent referral

A proportion of consultations end with a recommendation that cannot be carried out remotely: an examination, a swab, a smear, a pelvic ultrasound, a hysteroscopy or a biopsy. When that is the answer, you hear it in the appointment rather than at the end of a long detour.

What HeliosCheck.com does then is make the next appointment count. You receive a written request that names what should be examined, what is being looked for and what would be reassuring, along with the relevant guideline reference where one applies — so whoever sees you in person is not starting from a blank page. If you would like help working out which local route is quickest, ask us.

Where symptoms meet the thresholds set out in NICE guideline NG12 on suspected cancer referral, we say so directly and without softening it. Urgent referrals have to be made by a clinician with access to your local system, so we will tell you exactly who to contact and how quickly — usually the same week, sometimes the same day.

What we cannot be

HeliosCheck.com is a specialist layer alongside your regular care, not a replacement for it and not an emergency service. We do not provide antenatal scanning, booked maternity care, surgery or any service requiring same-day physical assessment. The FAQ explains where the boundary sits in more detail, and our terms of service put it formally.

For general symptom information between appointments, the NHS health A to Z is a reliable starting point, and the bodies we work from are listed at the foot of this page.

Do not wait for an online appointment if you are bleeding heavily enough to soak through a pad or tampon every hour for two hours or more; you have severe pelvic or abdominal pain with a fever; you feel faint or have collapsed; you have any bleeding after the menopause; or you have one-sided pain with bleeding in early pregnancy. Seek same-day medical care or contact your local emergency services. Our medical disclaimer sets out the limits of anything published here.
Technology & privacy

What is encrypted, what is recorded, what is kept

The consultation is the private part of a private practice. Here is exactly how it is handled — in summary here, and in full in our privacy policy.

A

Encrypted, in your browser

Consultations run over an encrypted connection in an ordinary browser. There is no app to install and no third-party account to create. Audio and video are transmitted, not stored.

B

Not recorded by default

We do not video or audio record consultations. If there were ever a reason to — a teaching request, for example — we would ask for your written consent first, each time, and declining would change nothing about your care.

C

What is kept, and for how long

Your intake form, clinical notes, written plan and follow-up messages form your medical record. They are held securely and retained for [retention period to be confirmed before launch], then deleted.

D

Who can see it

Your treating clinician, and the small number of staff who maintain the records system under confidentiality obligations. Nothing goes to an employer, insurer or relative without your written instruction.

You can ask for a copy of your record, ask us to correct it, or ask for it to be deleted where no legal retention duty applies. Read the full detail in our privacy policy and cookie policy.

Access

Making the appointment usable for everyone

An online consultation removes some barriers — travel, childcare, taking a whole morning off work — and quietly creates others. We would rather you told us what you need at the point of booking than worked around it silently on the day.

Tell us on the intake form or through contact, and we will arrange it before your appointment rather than during it. Our accessibility statement sets out the standard we hold this site and this service to, and how to report something that falls short.

Available on request, at no extra cost

  • A phone consultation instead of video, for any reason, at no extra cost
  • An interpreter — spoken language or sign — arranged if you tell us when you book
  • Your written plan in large print or plain text on request
  • Extra appointment time where a condition, anxiety or language makes 45 minutes too short
  • A partner, carer, family member or advocate on the call with you
  • Keyboard-navigable booking and intake forms, tested with screen readers
Practical questions

How the HeliosCheck.com process works in practice

Four of the questions we are asked most before a first appointment. The full FAQ covers fees, prescriptions, records and cancellations.

Do I need to download anything for a HeliosCheck.com consultation?

No. The link we send opens in an ordinary browser on a laptop, tablet or phone, and a short check runs your camera and microphone before you join. There is no app, no plug-in and no separate account. If your connection is unreliable, or you simply prefer it, ask for a phone consultation instead — for most questions it works just as well.

Is my consultation recorded?

Not by default. We do not video or audio record appointments, and nothing about the call is stored beyond the clinical notes your gynecologist writes during and after it. Those notes, your intake form, your written plan and your follow-up messages make up your medical record. Our privacy policy sets out how that record is stored, who can access it and how long it is kept.

Can HeliosCheck.com prescribe medication or order tests?

Often, yes. Where a prescription is clinically appropriate and safe to issue without an examination, it is included in your written plan. We do not prescribe controlled drugs remotely, and we will not prescribe for something that needs examining first. Tests can be requested in writing with the clinical detail a laboratory or imaging provider needs, though the sample or scan itself has to happen locally.

What happens if I need a physical examination?

We tell you during the appointment rather than stretching the consultation past what it can honestly do. You leave with a written request setting out exactly what should be examined and what is being looked for, so the person who sees you in person is not starting from nothing. Where the picture suggests something urgent, we say so plainly and point you to the fastest route in your own health system.

Guidance our recommendations are checked against

How we choose, cite and review sources is set out in our editorial policy.

Ready when you are

Start with the intake form. It costs you fifteen minutes, and it is the reason a HeliosCheck.com appointment can get to the answer instead of to the end of the history.

Book a consultation See what we cover