What has been the longest you have waited in A&E?

[Dreamingofnarrowboatlife]

I have been with my elderly mum in A&E since 1pm this afternoon.

We have been left in a corridor and little progress appears to have been made, it's very frustrating.

Mum had been running a temperature since Thursday, I called the GP surgery yesterday and because mum is in advanced Alzheimer's and housebound they decided to assess her over the phone and diagnosed a UTI, prescribed antibiotics and that was that.

She still had a high temperature this morning and was quite lethargic so I called 111 for advice, they said mum needed an ambulance. Paramedics came and thought mum's knee looked swollen and suspected a blood clot.

Blood clot dismissed at a&e assessment and they said they suspected arthritic sepsis. Mum had an x-ray hours ago and then an aspiration of the fluid in her knee. Orthopaedics then transferred her back to medical assessment and since 7pm we've been waiting and waiting. I've asked the only nurse who seems to be on this corridor and he appears to know very little and there seems to be no one else to ask, I've not seen a doctor in this corridor for hours, I've walked into the main area and no one seems to be able to help.

Mum's been in a&e a few times but this has definitely been the longest wait so far, coming up for 12 hours. Mum's slept the whole time but it's going to be a long night for my dad and I.

She is still in the corridor of a&e, where we left her in the early hours. I'm just about to go back.

God luck with your recovery.

Who actually designs those chairs? They are genuinely instruments of torture!

I'm a frequent flyer and the last few visits have been 39 hours - 10 day admitted, 27 hours - 3 days admitted and 17 hours - 14 days admitted. I actually dread having to go up to A and E. admitted via SAU is slightly quicker, and going independently or via ambulance makes no difference.

i hope your mum is comfortable soon

I spent 10 hours with Dd in A&E before she was admitted. We were back and forth for triage and different tests - minors, majors then back in the waiting room. Fortunately there were sufficient chairs and a vending machine.
With my dm we were waiting in the ambulance in the car park for over an hour as there was not even any corridor space…although as one of the paramedics stayed with us it was better than corridor care! We moved to a corridor, then minors, back to the corridor, majors, corridor, resus then in a private room on a ward to die.
I had to stand in the corridor; chairs were taken by elderly patients who were waiting for treatment and had nobody with them. It was awful (for them, not the fact that I had to stand)

@Dreamingofnarrowboatlife what an awful experience for you, your dad and your poor mum. Hopefully she will be admitted today.

I agree, but to be fair our local hospital is really crap at discharging too, which doesn’t help. Whilst my dad was in hospital last year I lost count of the amount of patients who were due to leave, but kept in because the paperwork or medication wasn’t ready. One man was there an extra 3 days.

With my dad, 48 hours.

He had dementia. Took him in after he’d fallen at the care home the day beifre. He was limping and they did nothing. Didn’t notify me as no one saw him fall (of course I complained, but SS too thier side and CQC were useless).

He Kept trying to stand up. He was screaming at points. I just kept being told by staff to keep him quiet.

I fell asleep at the 48 hour mark in the chair, I was exhausted. I woke up to find him gone.

The police found him by a canal 4 hours later. He had staggered out of the hospital (he couldn’t walk properly due to the dementia, arthritic knees and what he actually went in for - a broken leg).

I was told it was my fault for falling asleep or not calling another family member (there was no one else and the care home refused to send anyone, saying they were too busy and it was a weekend so the manager wasn’t there to authorise agency staff, plus, I really didn’t think they would leave an 88 year old for so long). I never dreamed he would be able to stagger past and leave the building.

Again, complained. Took it as far as I could - “lessons will be learned.”

20-30 years ago, there were several local / ‘cottage’ hospitals around here where patients could go for ‘step up’ and ‘step down’ care (nursing, really). They also acted as hubs for the district nurses.

these have all been closed and sold off to developers. In two cases, whizzy new wards were
promised as part of planning gain - new health hub clinics would be opened which would include a general
Nursing ward, as well as an X-Ray suite, a GP practice, specialist dentistry facilities etc. in both cases, the hospital ward element never opened or was immediately closed.

so there are now only the two acute hospitals, an hour apart, which have nowhere to discharge elderly and infirm patients who still need nursing care to. And of course, no follow up care from district nurses anyway

all the ‘Friends of XX Cottage Hospital’ groups campaigned their hearts out, to no avail. Once those resources were lost, they were lost forever.

That is absolutely terrible, your poor dad.

Just to add, every old person who is confined to a hospital bed for a week or two will very likely never walk again, never mind live independently. The acute hospitals aren’t geared up to provide the physio and therapy input that would keep those patients on their feet.

19 hours with cardiac symptoms, which I was subsequently admitted for. It was an absolutely awful experience. This was January 2022, so it’s a long standing problem in the NHS.

3pm til about 1.30–2am (was semi-delirious by then so didn't totally accurately note the time!)

4 hours, twice, though triaged before then. First when I was a child with a possibly fractured cheekbone. I remember the excitement of being called to the corridor from the waiting room only to be there for another two hours.

Second was when my dd developed a non-blanching rash. A nurse looked at it after 2 hours but had no clue what it was so told us to wait for the doctor. There were a few ambulances which turned up so we had to wait but the staff were most apologetic.

Recently I had to go.in for a fracture. Waited about two minutes for a porter (as the receptionist was not letting me walk further than necessary) and just a few minutes for a student nurse and then a doctor. Straight into x-ray then back for treatment. Know I'm very lucky to live near a small community hospital.

He died a few months later. I fought for some kind of justice for him for 18 months. Nothing. No one cared.

I've waited 12 hours more often than not. The only time it seemed quite quick was when I broke my hip. But that was because I was on a trolley rather than being made to sit on those horrible chairs. And I think they gave a morphine shot quite quickly. Then I kind of passed out. But I had to wait 8.5 hours for the ambulance to get me there!

14 hours, about 6 weeks ago with DD who was having cardiac issues. Moved out of the A&E waiting room quickly, but then stayed on the waiting/treatment areas in A&E for the rest of the time. All of the staff were doing their absolute best and were saints for putting up with some of the people waiting.

Not much shocks me about the NHS after my past few days of reading but I got chills reading this. I’m so sorry.

This week, 29hrs for 81yr old with recently starting treatment for leukemia. She blacked out and neighbour took her in. 29hrs in a wheelchair as she was wobbly on her feet. No food or drink brought round as no volunteers were on to do this. She ended up walking to 10mins to get food for her and another patient despite being a fall risk, and low BP. Ended up being discharged. This was on Wednesday. Friday she blacked out again, and is back in A&E. She is vomiting, severely dehydrated, been put in a pad, on bed in corridor. No hot drinks or food being brought round, not that she can keep them down anyway. She refused to go back initially so managed to see her GP but they said that her blood results from earlier in the week were so low that she shouldn't have been discharged and she needed to go back in. Friday night they tried to discharge again but her partner refused to let them thankfully as she has deteriorated even more. Another Dr has said that she needs to be admitted now. Not hopeful of them finding a ward bed for her but right now, I will take the stretcher in the corridor as long as she is on a drip and getting treatment.

About half an hour wait time.

This happened to mum last summer. She had a fall in the garden and fractured her neck. She went into hospital mobile and fully continent and came out 4 weeks later double incontinent and barely able to walk. Despite physio at home she has never recovered.

I mean, it gets worse. When he was found, it took an ambulance 3 hours to come. He was left laying by the side of the canal as his leg had totally given way by then. I’ll give it to the young police officers - they were great. They didn’t leave us, kept him as warm as they could. But we couldn’t move him, we didn’t know what damage he’d done.

A jogger had found him and called the police, he had a card on him with my details.

When he got to hospital, it was another 6 hours in the ambulance. Then they tried to wheel us back to the waiting room and that’s when I lost my shit saying I wanted to speak to someone to start the formal complaint now.

Only then was he moved to a bed in a bay bay. But they did nothing for hours more. He finally had an xray the following day.

All the time, he was confused and screaming. I kept telling staff he could no longer speak in coherent sentences. They wouldn’t listen.

No one would help. When he was taken to the ward, he was left laying with no water.

I had to be there to feed him - they would just plonk food on the table at the end of the bed, of course, he didn’t know what it was, and couldn’t have reached it with his leg anyway. If he didn’t have me, he would have starved and died of thirst in hospital.

He tried to get out of bed at night, fell over the bed guard and cut his head open on the bed.

Again, I was told “they couldn’t keep an eye one everyone.” He had advanced dementia. They try to wander, even with broken legs.

It was just horrific and I have diagnosed PTSD from that, the following legal battle and the couple of years prior where he was abused in another home.

I'm so sorry.

My opinion on elderly care in this country has probably been coloured by my own experience with my poor mum but I feel it is beyond incompetent in the UK, they just don't care, or it truly seems that way when you are in the thick of it.

36 hours. I was being treated. It was hell.

The poor lady, so sad but I am not surprised. I fear for the elderly, our care for them in this country is woefully inadequate, it really is.