To think this nurse shouldn't have laughed / scoffed at me for asking for a room?

Oh for gods sake. Just let it be. You’ve no idea what she faced that night and shes human. Don’t ask in future and if they can accommodate you the. I’m sure they will.

That's sadly not the case with a lot of childrens A&E areas across the country though.

We're in Cambridgeshire. Had to attend A&E 6 months ago with DS (2 at the time) with a split open head at 8pm. 8 hours waiting in total, triaged after 4 hours in a small office, then a further 4 hours of obs and waiting for nurse to glue his head back together which they had to do in the waiting area!. All this was done in a packed childrens A&E waiting area sat on chairs. It was packed in there. All the kids were (understandably) exhausted and ratty and needing sleep etc too as it was overnight. Only the very sickest managed to get placed in a room of their own.

You being unwell yourself doesn't mean you should get a room in children's A&E.

I think you should put in a strong complaint and insist she gets struck off for being in despair for the state that the government has put the NHS in by underfunding and giving NHS money to their friends for substandard PPE. A lot of the overcrowding in a and e could be prevented by funding primary services properly (gp, dentist, mental health........)

She's fine. She went home after being observed for 6 hours so didn't need a room and as op asked for a room because she was feeling unwell that's not an appropriate reason for a room request.

Really? You think this is important? Come on, most people wouldn't care, or even notice.
I think the bigger issue is why you seem to have a "frequent flyer" card for A &E..... yes, there may be a good reason, but most people don't go to A&E from one year to the next, even if they do have kids.

Your daughter didn’t need a room and your condition is irrelevant given it’s a children’s A&E. stop being so over sensitive.

Watch Ch4 dispatches. You might think differently. It's hard to be 100% professional 24/7. I'm hope your LO is ok now

The nurse properly scoffed because elsewhere in the hospital people are waiting in corridors for hours, days even to get a bed after they have been admitted. I've been to a@e a few times with my kids over the years. We are usually taken to a room to speak to the nurse or a doctor then sent back to the waiting room to wait for treatment while the next child is seen in the room. With one of my kids who was seriously unwell we had to sit in the a@e waiting room for 10 hours before we got a bed on a ward which then turned into a week long stay in hospital. Count yourself lucky you where only in there for 6 hours and not admitted. You thinking you deserve a room for yourselve in children's a@e in s quite frankly unacceptable on your part.

You are aware that hospitals are full of sick people... thats LITERALLY what they are for.

If you can't go to hospital when sick then where do you think the sick should go?

Phone 111 with extreme vomiting, they will send you to A&E.

For the record I have been in A&E 3 times with vomiting in the last 4 years... don't worry you wont catch my bleeding ulcer which is caused by a hernia which intern was caused by an allergic reaction. The medical service believe vomiting blood to be something pretty A&E worthy though.

Why are you getting angry at being told not to be ridiculous yet going around calling everyone daft and ignorant?

She probably thought you were out of touch with reality considering the state of play at the moment. Probably not laughing at you, more just like a the NHS are bleeding us dry how can you not know this kind of thing!

Sounds like you have mixed up a private hospital with an nhs hospital service. I can definitely see the funny side.

I'd just settle for getting a proper diagnosis and treatment in A&E however long I had to wait for it. Wouldn't care about eye rolling or scoffing. Last time I had to go to A&E they sent me home with a perforated bowel, saying it was a pulled muscle.

TBH I would say she was rude, but I also think you need to read the room OP, you are in A&E a lot, so you'll know what's going on with the NHS, the GPs, Nurses and everyone else. Asking for something that was above what they were already doing was U in my view.

So this is a situation where you both could have acted better than you did.
You confronted her, I'd suggest now just leaving the situation. And in future, don't ask people being stretched to breaking point, for more than would usually be expected.

You say that, but I've only had to go to a & e with my toddler once, we spent 8 hours there for observation and tests during the daytime. Once triaged, I was put in one of these rooms, not sure if they are the same, but they have three solid walls and a curtain front, inside was a main bed in the middle, a comfy chair to the side and another smaller bed on the other side. There were 5 rooms in a row, down a glass corridor and the whole time we were there, only one other person used one of those rooms briefly, it was like we were in a ghost town, I found the whole experience quite eerie.

I remember thinking at the time it seems such a shame that adult A&E is rammed to the rafters and childrens A&E next door is virtually empty. I can understand if OP goes to childrens A&E quite a lot and her experience was like ours, you would probably assume that they can (and frequently do) use their discretion to allow you to wait in one.

This! Cut her some slack: she’s working in an under resourced A&E and someone (who apparently goes there a lot) asks for a room. Maybe it’s just your interpretation as she said she didn’t. Personally, I’d understand it if she did - it seems a ridiculous request given the state of our hospitals

Yes sorry that’s what I meant @LordSnot

YABU. Unless you’ve been under a rock you’d know NHS is on its knees. It’s not the Ritz you can’t just go in with child who is somewhat poorly (but well enough to be discharged by today) and ask a room. Did you think the rest of the people were feeling on top of the world and there for the day out? My FIL (92) injured his leg recently. He spent 3 nights and days on a trolley in the A &E corridor He took it all in good spirits.

The OP has never been given a room. Her child is sometimes put in a room.

Of course she shouldn’t have laughed, it’s completely unprofessional.

It is clearly not a far fetched request since OP and others have been given a room on multiple occasions. Even if it was unlikely or she was laughing at the current state of the nhs, that is no excuse to be reacting that way to the request of a sick person who was there with a young child struggling to breathe.

I don't think you being ill means the actual patient needs a room more? Like yeah, sucks to be you, but I'd take it as a good sign that my kid looked ok enough to wait around on a chair.

We've almost always been offered a bed in a cubicle/ room in Children's A&E. A lot of the time you need to wait for obs. If I were in the main A&E I'd expect to be stuck on the plastic chairs but I don't think OP's expectation of a bed for her little one and a comfy chair to sit on was unusual.

@Toptotoe some children sadly are frequently unwell and have to go to A+E regularly for treatment.
It's not unusual to go many times if your child has a chronic illness or disability (which we don't know about the OPs child and we don't need to know because it's not our business).

No the nurse didn’t “fuck up”. That’s not a “fuck up”. It is clearly important to you though that she did “fuck up”. Has she got to be wrong so you can be right?