Horror I witnessed last night NHS

[ElisabethZott]

At 3pm yesterday I took my 88 yr old mum to hospital as she had an unexpected, sudden anaphylactic reaction to one of her meds and her tongue and throat swelled up to the extent she was struggling to breathe/talk/ swallow. I drove her there because I knew the ambulance wait can be hours.
I witnessed pure absolute carnage. I worked for the wonderful NHS for 30 years and yesterday I had first hand experience of the struggles the poor staff. I have never seen such a horrendous sight of so many trollies with extremely sick and dying patients lining the corridors. I couldn’t begin to count them but there were dozens and dozens. It’s only early November, I can only say, for your own sakes, unless you have a life threatening condition, do not go to A&E.
The staff were absolutely brilliant but there’s not enough of them. The care and kindness they showed us amazing. DM didn’t join the trolley queue as her airways were compromised so we went to the observation ward where she has stayed on a trolly overnight. All A&E wards were rammed to capacity with people not even having their own bay, they were just squeezed into any available space.
Once mum had steroids and anti histamines and she stabilised ( because they were working at full speed to treat other patients) the staff simply didn’t have to time or capacity to help mum. She was offered no water, no blankets no food ( her tongue swelling had gone down a little and she hadn’t eaten all day ). You can see by the tone of my post I am no way being critical of the fantastic medical team , they were pushed to the limits. I don’t really know the point of this thread except to say I am so worried what’s going to happen when winter starts properly.

Thank you NHS but you too need looking after too because you are really broken and sick

This generation is going to place huge pressures on the public purse as they age - not just the NHS

But presumably a lot of them paid taxes and NI all their working lives?

And presumably the government would be competent enough to deal with the situation. They would have been aware aware for a long time that this was coming, and should have a strategy in place in order to cope?

This culture of blaming other generations/cultures/people different to you is a tactic used by government to deflect where the real problem lies, and it leaves a really bad taste.

The blame sits firmly with the government, who have well and truly fucked us all over.

The NHS is not fit for purpose and hasn’t been for years. The model as it stands where everything is free to everyone simply cannot cope. Mass immigration has not helped and neither has the fact it has been poorly run.
Blaming the Tories is far too simplistic, it was failing under Labour too. It has wrongly been worshipped as some sort of sacred cow where more and more of our taxes are poured into it in the hope of improving it. Someone in power needs to have the guts to admit it’s never going to work in its current form and start looking at the French or German models.

My mum had a fall a couple of weeks ago. The ambulance came within 20 mins, she was handed over at the hospital and put straight into a bay. Seen by a dr within 30 mins and sent for CT. My mum spent nearly 2 weeks in hospital and on the whole the care was fantastic.

This is a North London hospital.

Agree with this 100%

@the @TheRealLilyMunster They did pay NI all their lives, but NI is spent there and then, in the year it's paid. So the NI they paid was spent caring for the people who were elderly and sick the year they were paying it. Now we have a large generation of elderly people no longer paying NI because they are retired. So it is our NI that is paying for them, but it isn't enough to pay for them, because they are such a large cohort. We have a big stone balanced on top of a little stone, basically. It can't hold.

Absolutely this.

They’ve been in power for 13 years. Why aren’t they spending that money wisely so the NHS does work?

My mum is normally independent and self sufficient but over the last week I have seen her deteriorate. I called the GP on Thursday and asked if she could have blood tests done and he said “ our hands are tied, we cannot help your mother, you need to go to A&E”.
Mum has not had her medication reviewed or had bloods done for at least a year as it’s impossible to get an appointment for a general review

I don't just think you can blame it on the Tories. From what I remember from the past, all our successive governments have screwed up our country, contributing to this.

Also, our nation is one of overweight, stressed out, and inactive people. It's only going to get worse. We also have an aging population living longer, and with that comes many ailments. My own parents and in-laws are in the doctors at lease once a fortnight with things that are natural to an 85 year old. They go there for tiredness, sore knees, a painful shoulder etc. My own grandparents lived till they were 80, and passed away peacefully in their sleep. That just wouldn't happen now. They would be given blood test after blood test and have 15 years added onto their life with every medication under the sun. I'm not saying that isn't morally right, I am just saying that demand for our NHS has increased exponentially due to an aging population, and poor general health.

When this increase in demand just can't be met through recruitment, resources, and government inaction, that is when you get to the point we are at.

Funding is going up. It’s not like the NHS isn’t taking a huge amount of taxes currently.

By 2036 1 in 11 will be employed by the NHS. Anyone can see what a behemoth it is.

How much more funding do you think would fix the issues?

The NHS is broken - poorly run, disorganised chaos, more funding won’t fix it, radical reform is needed

Everyone can keep blaming the tories but it’s so much more than that. It isn’t fit for purpose anymore. The demands are so different in this day and age. People living longer than ever. Lack of responsibility for own health. Etc.

In my opinion the NHS can only get worse on its current model. It was created with the idea of providing core, essential health care. As the definition of health has widened so has our expectation of what should be covered on the NHS, forcing the budget to be spread very thinly.

Life expectancy has increased massively, as has the birth rate. Many of the services we recieve on the NHS now never even existed at its creation or even 30 years ago.

I've always worked for the NHS and am passionate about universal health care for all but I do think we have reached a point where it needs to be either stripped back to a much better basic service (topped up your self privately) or a much higher NHS specific income tax - consideration would need to be given to equality in care for those on lower incomes.

When I look at my tax and NI contributions I cannot think that they cover the yearly cost of healthcare provision for me and my two children and we aren't big users. In my view more money could (and should) come out of my leisure budget to pay for vital health care for me and my family. We aren't wealthy, we've just gone down to one car as we can't afford two. But we can afford the odd take away / UK holiday and in my mind morally that money should go into our own health care provision before luxuries and treats.

Private health care isn't the answer as it rarelys covers any emergency care we might need, childhood vaccinations etc plus we would still have to use A&E, and it rarely covers things like intensive care.

I'm very passionate that the skills, experience and knowledge of NHS staff is second to none (i am not clinical so I am not singing my own praises here!). I would prefer to pay more for my NHS care knowing that's exactly where that proportion of my tax was going and that the staff treating me recieve better pay and working conditions to do this.

As an aside, every single trip we have had to A&E in our family (bar one fall requiring stitches) has been because the GP surgery have been unable to see children with tonsillitis, ear infections etc until its got so serious that weekend urgent care is required. Personally I feel it is access to urgent non-emergency care is where the pressure lies at the moment.

Staffing is the problem

I've spent 13 years working for the NHS in a clerical role

I'm at the top of Band 2 and can go no further

I'm earning about £1ph more than minimum wage

Next financial year, it'll be about 8p an hour more than minimum wage

Retention and recruitment of staff, both clerical and clinical are affected by low pay rates

There are too many people who are chronically ill, too few carers and too few clinical staff

Throwing money at a semi-privatised NHS, where millions go into the pockets of shareholders and staff aren't encouraged to stay isn't enough

I had a similar experience with my 92 year old Nan a few weeks ago, there were 176 in A&E for various different things and the corridors were lined. My Nan spent a night in intensive care due to severe breathing issues but others weren’t so lucky. She was moved to a bay and went to a ward at 7pm the next night. I blame the Tories!

The NHS needs a total reform. Throwing more money at it is not the answer.

Imo the NHS needs to be run by doctors and nurses.

There is so much money wasted. If that could stop it would be a start.

Hospital entrances looking like hotels is unnecessary for a start!

I've told this story before but many years ago my mum worked at our nearest hospital. The top management's degrees were in hospitality. Hotel management.

The most outrageous story she told me was about the resources put in to making the front look amazing while behind the scenes stuff - like bloody cleaning the hospital, were chronically underfunded. One time they redid the concourse and then immediately did it again because Ms Big Boss Knows Nowt said it was, and I quote, "the wrong shade of blue". And that apparently was more important than having more than one cleaner doing two wards.

We can chuck all the money we want at the NHS but until it is taken apart and rebuilt it will remain not fit for purpose.

How much more do you think it would take so it does work?

And not just now but each year as elderly complex needs go up, most care is at end of people’s lives

The drug she became suddenly allergic to was Ramipril which is an ACE inhibitor ( for blood pressure)She’s been on it for years and the staff said it’s notorious for causing anaphylaxis even if it’s been tolerated for years

No they aren't, there actually isn't much money to be made. What they are doing is grinding it down so that they can flood it with lesser qualified staff and the public will accept it as its better than nothing, see PAs etc.

The trouble is, there's no alternative to A & E.

My daughter in law died last year. Blood clot on the brain.

Over 5 days this the story.

Phoned GP, with headaches 10 times, GP denied this number at the inquest but it could be proved by telephone records. Never got passed the receptionist, asked by the coroner what medical qualifications the receptionists have, answer none.

Walk-in centre, have no access to medical records, wrongly diagnosed, medical qualifications, pharmacist.

111, operator could barely speak English and the first ten minutes of the call, him not understanding a perfectly understandable accent and her trying to explain her name and address. During the questioning, he was pressing the wrong buttons for example regarding headaches, she said yes three times and he pressed no three times. Medical qualifications, a 10 week course but having worked for them 7 years. He deemed her not requiring an ambulance, she lived another 48 hours.

I've worked in the NHS under a Labour government and it was just the same. Our cupboard were empty with no staff with a ban on agency staff. It is not going to change with a general election unless it has a major reform.

Sorry for what your Mumm went through.

A change of Government will not change the state of the NHS

A general election won’t solve the NHS. No matter what party comes in there isn’t an infinite amount of money. It’s really not so simple. While the Tories have absolutely made it worse, It’s really broken. Im not sure what the answer is.

NHS current employee. Patient facing.

It will only get worse, sadly. Yes, an absolute fortune is pumped into the NHS year after year but how much of that actually goes into frontline care? The amount of financial waste is criminal.

That, and the fact that the population is increasing all the time is a recipe for disaster.