In the very early hours of yesterday morning, my DH woke with excruciating pain in his side and across his lower back. DH is not a complainer and rarely poorly, therefore I knew it must be bad, so at 1am we set off for A&E.
We arrived at about 1.30am (Wales) and DH proceeded to have his bloods and other samples collected etc and then came the wait…15 hours. We finally arrived home at 5pm this afternoon.
Luckily DH is fine. It looks like a stomach ulcer from Ibuprofen use, but I was shocked by what A&E is dealing with. Just last night there were 6 people brought in due to suicide attempts or threats, often with 2 police officers per person.
I was sat near the reception and there was no attempt to promote confidentiality, I suppose it was impossible being as busy as it was. Phone numbers and addresses, full names etc said aloud.
So in the space of just a few hours there were six poor people in A&E due to threat of suicide; held by police or security all night until the MH team came in this morning; another 4 or 5 people were in, clearly for other severe mental health issues - panic attacks; types of personality disorders etc There were only a few people with breaks or falls or bad tummy’s. The majority, were MH related. And seeing those people was a real eye opener too - the MH issues were blinding clear bless them and not at all mild.
Is this a sign of the current times? We clearly need so much more time and money put into MH. Was it just a particularly bad night, or is it always like this?
The staff were amazing with these people. Real professionals with compassion and understanding, but there were sooo many people to try to deal with, taking up a lot of time and resource.
I really was shocked by the extent of the issue last night. It’s seems such a very big problem.