97 Yr old Gran waiting 8 hours for an ambulance with a broken hip!

My mother had very good care before she died in a hospital last year.

Every time an ambulance came out for my elderly mum, they’d ask her if she had a do not resuscitate instruction. She didn’t know, she’d say yes. That’s fine. Long story short, she would be patched up and chucked out. Until they sent her home sick and she had a massive stroke and then died two weeks later. I don’t think anyone cares about the elderly anymore. A nurse told me, “we have younger people who need us more”. Dealing with the lack of joined up thinking during a pandemic and beyond nearly gave me PTSD. The saddest thing though, you should see the state of the room mum was sent to die in. Peeling wallpaper. Decrepit ceiling. Shit on the windows that didn’t open. What a place to go.

Thekorma

I've no idea why you have reframed Covid lockdown.
Lockdown was to stop transmission of disease to protect the public.
NHS workers worked in a Covid infected environment to help sick people.

I am glad your Gran finally got treatment. This thread is scary and depressing. Getting older myself now and have only ever bothered the NHS for childbirth and mammograms and smears but terrified to that when I need it one day it basically won't be there in any timely, useful way.

What I want to ask about is the suggestion to drive your sick family member to a and yourself. If you do this, are you still waiting behind the people who are outside in the queuing ambulances? I assume you must be else they would never get their patients through the door and into beds?

How do you think that's going to help ?

It isn't the ambulance service that's the issue here and I assure you, telling them you'll hold them responsible won't make a joy of difference but it will make the call handler feel awful

Guess what? It isn't 2010 any more.

Perhaps other nations have moved on and the UK has stagnated.

We had a home in France pre 2010. DS broke his arm in the UK in 2005 and in France in 2006. France was better then and is better now.

In 2010 the NHS was independently judged to be the most efficient healthcare system in the world.
But since then posts like admin have been cut, This reduces efficiency.

@RosesAndHellebores Yes, it does. You have my total sympathy, all so wrong. It seems we just have to go it alone.

This l saw the utter waste while volunteering some years ago. It does not necessarily need more money just restructuring from top to bottom.

I hear the Dutch Gp standard response is to take paracetamol for everything.

I agree.

thats horrific!

I witnessed first hand just how fucked the NHS is.

Took my 9month old to a&e and was struggling to breathe and had a seizure. Called for an ambulance to be told it was an hour wait, thought sod this I’m 15 mins away, will drive.

17 hours we waited to be seen and in the end only got taken through as I kicked up hell at how much she was struggling. She is positive with RSV and in nicu hooked up to oxygen fighting to get better.

Its broken beyond repair. That is simply not forgivable for me.

My mother broke her hip and had another three years of fairly good quality life. Yes, she ended up in care, but that was due to mild dementia, not her hip. She had as much mobility after her fall as she did beforehand. If you had suggested she was ready to pop off she would have not agreed with you. You sound very ignorant.

What have you seen on this thread which makes you think she isn't capable? What a nasty response. I know a woman who is 102, lives alone with no help and is extremely capable. Anyone can break a leg/hip, it doesn't just happen to the elderly you know.

Oh yes. 5th break in five years due to osteoporosis for which I'd already had three years of zolendronate infusions and then maintenance doses every 18 months. And wham another vertebrae went.

Because I was under 65 I didn't quite meet the bar fir the next line, teriparitide by injection, on the NHS, but I could have it if I paid £2,400 for a two year course.

It's extraordinary, NiCE says a displaced dorsal radius fracture should not be reduced with gas and air alone. My local hospital ignores this because it's only guidance. NICE guidance says teriparatide for my level of osteoporosis can't be given for under 65's. The NHS has to follow this guidance. If it saves money the uidance can be ignored, if it costs money the guidance cannot be ignored.

Notwithstanding the fact that I had to pay for a private consultation and MRI scan to identify the fracture because I wasn't listened to.

When I went to my GP to raise concerns, she asked me to touch my toes. I could get down to mid shin. She therfore told me at week 6 that if Incoukd do that I couldn't have a broken vertebrae and therefore she wouldn't refer me.

The system stinks.

Yes, this used to happen to my mum. I remember a doctor saying to me once "But there's no pain with osteoporosis!"

What?!

I work in social care. Social care get blamed a lot but the truth is that many of the people we see should be receiving fully funded NHS care because they are dying, or are needing care because they are waiting for operations that would enable them to be independent or we are picking up the pieces when they are discharged home without care whilst be severely ill.

Best wishes to your Gran OP. Someone might correct me, but I think a leg fracture could be less serious than the hip.

If relatives transporting patients with undiagnosed injuries is safe, how come some enterprising person hasn't set up such a service? Because it's not, would be my guess.

@RosesAndHellebores Thank you.
I do have Osteoporosis & this was my second fracture. Both innocuous reasons eg coughing.
In reality they are acutely painful & take far longer than 6 weeks to heal. Also painkillers don’t really work.
I hope you have had a Dexa scan to check bone density.

The #1 reason France and Germany do better is that they spend more money. The social insurance based system does mean that politicians have less influence over spending. In the UK, politicians choke it off.

Insurance does add overhead cost but it depends on type. Leaving the US aside as it's massively complex and fragmented, the Swiss spend the most and there you are required to purchase insurance. The Dutch do that too, but their system is quite tightly regulated and they spend much less (Dutch healthcare is apparently regarded as quite tightfisted).

Fabulous. Will be watching with great hope how it will be in 5 years with a Labour government. All will be working in fantastic order. Right?

"These people"

Charming.

This breaks my heart. Our health system is so broken that this is allowed to carry on so long.

Wow. You sound like a horrible person