I live in Bristol, and just occasionally I am ill enough to have to visit my NHS doctor. So imagine my horror when I heard on the news that Bristol doctors' waiting rooms are to be graced with live music.

Once I had got over wondering whether it was April 1, and asking my partner whether I had heard right, I got angry. Then I pulled myself together and tried to imagine what it would be like. Then I got upset.

You often have to wait for an hour or more in my surgery, since it has no appointments. The waiting room can be full, but at least it's usually quiet. I take my laptop or a pile of papers and work. So the hour is not entirely wasted, and I don't get too anxious. But now, with live music ...

Perhaps it isn't true, I thought. So I rang my surgery. They knew nothing about it. Try the Avon health authority, they said. They knew nothing about it. Ring Radio 4, if that's where you heard the story, they said (this was, obviously, not someone who had ever tried ringing Radio 4). Google took me straight to the charity Live Music Now! - and then began some interesting calls.

Talk about defensiveness. Everyone I spoke to asked immediately whether I was press, and then told me a) that they were not saying which surgeries were targeted, b) that it hadn't started yet but may happen on Friday, c) that they had had some very bad press indeed and d) "He won't be playing pan pipes" (interesting, that one).

It turns out that the bad press is mostly about who is paying (the answer is the charity, not the NHS). I was assured that the purpose was to take live music to people who might otherwise never experience it, and to provide instruments for children to look at; there was no intention of "blasting at people who can't get away from it".

But how can you have live music in a waiting room and not be "blasting at people who can't get away from it."? I know from failed attempts to nip out and post a letter that in my surgery, once you've joined the list, you have to stay put. Health and Safety, they say; what if there's a fire? So I would be stuck there, upset and anxious. Yes, I know there are some people - the evidence suggests lots of people - who are calmed by music, but not me, and I know I'm not alone. If it's great music, I might burst into tears with emotion; if it's old and familiar, I might get washed over with painful memories; and if it's unfamiliar and loud, I'll just get anxious and want to run away - and I don't want to do any of these things in public. I just want to sit quietly and read.

If this gruesome plan goes ahead, I won't be able to read or work while I wait. Instead of choosing what I want to do, I will be forced to join everyone else and listen, or pay to go private Please, no.

The concept of "more choice in the NHS" is getting more slippery every day.