To wish I could stop paying into the utterly broken NHS black hole

Complete rubbish. Bring in private system then why not, you will have the same system but pay for it - it's probably going to be better for staff pay etc it's the patients who will suffer though like in dentistry.

They also like to skew the figures.

I visit the eye department for a skin condition around eyes and had a few minor ops to remove cysts which are look bad or get inflamed, such as one where my glasses' nose pad sits. Inherited the skin condition from my DF which is the only negative thing I have inherited from. He had to have skin grafts, have a third of his face covered in dressings.

Anyway I get called in to do a sight test more/less of the time of the appt. Then don't see the consultant myself until an hour or so after the appt time. The NHS do this to improve the targets. My DF said the sight test didn't happen 15 years ago. I get the sight test even though I am not seeing the consultant or her junior doctors about my sight!

No it's not rude. If you see a patient in clinic and they are acutely unwell you have to manage that patient and admit them if needed while also running clinic, for example. Or if too many patients are booked in without enough staff in the clinic, time will run over inevitably. If a clinic finishes at six pm when the doctor finishes work at five pm do you think they get any pay for that? No, because they couldn't leave a sick patient unwell and they can't send you home as they have run out of time. Therefore they bring you in or the nurse brings you in but they obviously have to focus on the notes especially with a complex patient.
It's not like with a lawyer when you get paid per minute or per letter, the clinician cannot leave people unwell, dying or unseen so there is a lot of unpaid overtime and missed breaks and lunch.
Try to have some respect.

You are responsible for paying taxes like everyone else, not only for yourself but for the entire population. I've never called the Police but I still pay my taxes without complaining, it's a public service. I've never had a social worker but they are still needed.
Some of the examples on here are just lay opinion of a perceived error by clinicians when actually like it or not they are making clinical decisions based on evidence and clinical presentation and need.

I understand that in many places the NHS does not function adequately and that service is poor. DS has found this with relation to a serious back problem, and it's unacceptable.
However, he and his family had excellent care regarding a serious orthopaedic issue (DDIL), child mental health and GP services over a range of medical problems.
My own GP service is very good, with a range of doctors, specialist nurses and pharmacists working effectively. Appointments are triaged by a team including a GP. Appointments can be requested by phone, and you always get a callback the same day, with a face to face appointment if requested. Repeat prescriptions are well managed and medication can be picked up from a vending machine. The practice is well managed and innovative - this is down to the senior partners' good leadership and initiative.
Both I and a close family member have, in the last couple of years, accessed excellent hospital services including ophthalmology, podiatry, neurology and orthopaedics, with very short waiting times. This is in a largely rural and not particularly affluent part of the country.

There is also an arrogance of the NHS who act as if they are doing you a favour in seeing you. My immediate family ( DH and me at times) are paying a lot of tax and lots of that is going to the NHS. When DS was little my DH and I had to wait for an appointment for the paediatrician with a 2 or 3 hour delay - DH trying to field work on his laptop as he has lots or work to do. We would go into the room and the Consultant keep us sitting there whilst reading DS’s notes for 15 or 20 minutes. In what other private business could you do that? It’s extremely disrespectful arrogant and rude. As a former lawyer if I treated any client like that I would have been fired. I had to show respect to everyone including the sexual offender in the police cell. The sheer arrogance and superiority of the consultant was breathtaking.

Bring in the French system please where you have an appointment and are seen on time with notes read.

People in the NHS have to remember that some families are actually funding their pay believe it or not although many are not net contributors some are. I demand to be treated as a client and not a charity case thanks. I dislike the God like attitude of some consultants and GPs even GP receptionists. We see the GP about once every several years- my son more. So if I call there is clearly a reason.

So saying friends are consultants and they are lovely - it depends on who you get.

I'm not sure if you mean it that way but this seems to suggest that people earning below net contributor levels aren't entitled to expect decent care.

OP has a right to be disappointed in the care that she has been received regardless of what she has paid in.

Edited for typo

Getting cancer doesn't mean losing your house, but with the state of the NHS as it is it can mean unnecessarily losing your life because it takes so bloody long to get someone to stop fobbing you off and actually get diagnosed (Once you are then it's fantastic)

Have enough cash to either pay for insurance or pay ad-hoc as needed!

Obviously we still need to use the NHS sometimes but if you have the option to pay privately, it's a great comfort.

Sometimes NHS send patients to private hospitals. How much does that cost them? Probably more than a person paying for the surgery etc themselves. I had my gallbladder removed at Nuffield. Only reason I went to Nuffield was when my GP did a choose and book for seeing a consultant, there were no appointments at the two NHS hospitals and another at a smaller hospital which I couldn't do as had a one off event to attend in London. Had the surgery and recovered about 2 weeks before the event in London!

That's a clinical decision , hip pinning is often better than total hip replacement for stability of fracture depending on the type. It's an evidence based decision by a highly qualified orthopaedic /surgeon .

I work in the NHS. It's worse than people realise.
I've been off for 6 months because I couldn't get an MRI and therefore diagnosis. I'm dying to get back to work, I hate being off sick.
My hips have disintegrated and I need a spinal op which will be a other 2 to 3 years. I'll be treating patients on my walking frame or a wheelchair because I'm determined to get back to work, I can't afford not to. I live alone and being isolated at home makes me mentally ill.
I can sit to do my job but it won't be easy and I'll be in constant pain. If I could have my operation tomorrow I'd have years of good life left. As it is I'll just deteriorate. Such a waste of a highly specialised staff member.

The NHS is absolutely broken but your taxes you pay fund not only the NHS but social care, police, fire, education etc so on £30k a year you will have already got out what you put into the NHS with treatment for cervical cancer, and having 2 children. Absolutely not digging you out on your salary as mine is similar but this isn't a great argument.

I do wholeheartedly agree though that the system is broken and we are failing patients.

who was it that refused you a smear based on your symptoms as it’s a red flag so you are entitled to a smear? who did you speak to?

Did you pursue this with the practice? Have you spoken with the practice manager?
The difficulty here is that you had a private smear sent to a private lab.

No there shouldn’t. Some people
just dip into private as and when they desperately need it and can’t afford private insurance.

We are a family of 5. No way could we afford insurance. Overall the NHS has been great( I can see a GP on the day I ring if I’m not fussy who and can see somebody specific within 2 weeks), other care in all sorts of fields has been fantastic and what you would expect from the NHS. MH provision and ND diagnostics not so great. Have recently had to be pay for a private psych for my son and private therapy. We’ll probably wait for 5 years for his HS ND diagnosis as NHS is better and can’t afford £3k. Don’t think the rich who can afford private insurance should get tax breaks when we can’t but still have to pay private at times.

Personally I’d just like descent nhs funding and better organisation. The previous government failed on both.

You are right OP. We've just paid out £10,000 for a private op (massive knee injury) and further treatment for one of my kids.

The process of going through the NHS from turning up in A&E whereby they refused to scan to finally seeing a consultant 7 months later who said he had no idea when they could operate because lists were so long has been utterly soul destroying. We've paid for a private MRI, operation and physio.

I never thought I'd say this in my lifetime but I would be very happy to move to an insurance model like they have in France.

That’s shit, I had a bleed after sex and the Drs were pretty good with investigating it although I didn’t have a smear as it was about a year since my previous one, I had swabs/ultrasound/blood test and they found a polyp which was whipped out within 6 months (polyps are rarely cancerous but I still wanted it out).
nhs is very hit and miss - I have private healthcare too - but still use nhs for ongoing issues or anything I don’t deem time sensitive.
Your taxes don’t just go in the nhs you know!

@tamade I am not any kind of medic

Evidently

But if those cells are removed/resolve, can there be further cell damage years down the line without another positive HPV test?

What I mean is that in the UK HCPs perform a smear but if HPV negative they don't look at the cells. Your use of 'gyno' makes me think you're in the US. There are much less invasive ways of testing for HPV, a urine test for example, so women are put through an invasive test for potentially no reason. As you say, cell abnormalities are not necessarily linked to HPV, so there will be women who go for smears and have abnormal cells but are HPV negative and therefore are missed. I guess you also have visual examination of cervix.

Of course not, but OP is using vastly exaggerated figures (she pays 4.6% of her salary into national insurance, not 25%).

10 years ago, my DM broke her hip aged 63. She was classed too young to have a full hip replacement.

So she had hip pinned, pin removed and about 2 years later, hip replacement.

If she had her hip replacement surgery as soon as she broke it, that would saved NHS two operations, plus staying at hospital, post surgery stuff like physio.

I also believe that the DM's walking style and the stresses of having one hip operated on three times in 2 years caused her other hip to be replaced.

I worked in the NHS until I retired, and its never been "underfunded", just mismanaged. I hope Wes Streeting is allowed to reform it, needs it desperately. I live in Wales (NHS run by Labour) and wouldn't dream of going on a waiting list for an op, I'd be dead first. My savings will be going on any NHS treatment I might need.

We use it quarterly for my child's secondary care needs and can't fault it.

The callousness of this sentence, repeated several times on this thread is why the OP is right in her own way. You need to be a millionaire tax contributor to have a valid opinion on the sainted NHS?

What's your plan for when you retire? Wondering the same thing for myself.