To be angry about how long it took to be discharged from hospital yesterday?

[Kirisox]

Gave birth to DS last Saturday afternoon via emcs and both he and I had further complications resulting in a stay in hospital. I was told by both of our doctors at 11am on Friday that they were happy for us to be discharged today, but I would just need to wait for my notes and prescription.
My poor, supportive, amazing DP and I were still waiting to leave with very few updates at 6 pm and eventually left at 7. I can honestly say today was the low point of what was otherwise a reasonable post natal care experience.
The main delay was caused by the labour ward failing to have written up my notes when I left there for the post natal care, and when this was done my attending midwife was unsure of how to use the relevant computer system to transfer the notes (or something like that...). This is the same labour ward who failed to recognise how much blood i lost during surgery which meant i needed a transfusion on Monday.
AIBU to think it's being unreasonable to wait this long for discharge paperwork?

Frustrating, but in the great scheme of things (and compared to the blood transfusion business) nothing to get your knickers in a twist about.

Enjoy being home, and congratulations!

You should not have had to wait. My Dad was in hospital (RSurreyCH) a couple of weeks ago, and when he was discharged, had a similar wait. He was evicted from his bed before lunch, to free it up, and had to hang around until early evening. The reason for his wait was the way the pharmacy operates, in that they send out all the drugs at set times, including those for patients being discharged, and he would have got out over an hour sooner if the ward he was on had been at the start of the drugs run. I have been in hospitals elsewhere (WGH Edin for example) where patients being discharged are discharged from the ward within an hour, and those who need drugs go via the pharmacy to collect them.
Had I been at the hospital with My dad, I would have taken him home, and returned to collect his drugs later. In your position, I would not have waited, I would have just walked out (but not in a flouncy self-obsessed way).

you have my sympathies, its not fun being in hospital and I am sure you couldn't wait to take your baby home. I was in for 36 hours after cs and that felt like long enough! However, as others have said, they don't have the staff to get you discharged quicker, so yabu.

Enjoy all the newborn cuddles!

It took ages for my discharge paperwork to be sorted out both times I had cs's.

With DD the midwife told me I was going to be discharged at breakfast time but it was 3pm before the paperwork turned up. They're just dead busy.

Enjoy being at home again .

Yanbu to feel bit narked (I was desperate to get home after dd born ) - but IMHO it always takes ages for all
Reasons said before and I know now to bring a book and expect a wait.

That said when I waited 9 hours post erpc where first I had to endure someone in next beds visitor who was pregnant going on about how they were so excited re baby and then registrar said were delayed as had a death in antenatal ward (I don't know WTF was goin on there as am sure that breaks all sorts of confidentiality policies) . That is one hospital I have never gone back to

I understand the frustration of being kept waiting, but being angry over it is daft. Hospitals are busy places and they have genuine emergencies to attend to. Getting you your notes and prescription is not an emergency, therefore, reasonably, other cases were prioritised over you.

Honestly, if that's the only complaint you have, you should be grinning from ear to ear about how you were treated.

Congratulations and now go enjoy newborn cuddles!

YANBU to be annoyed. I was told I could go "first thing in the morning and finally got out at 1pm. Why? Because even though I had all the medication I needed before I left and waved it under the MW's nose she didn't believe and went to go check, just incase. and She finally got back to me after an hour and a half to tell me I had indeed been handed my medication by her collegue the night before.

Congratulations on your new arrival!

I understand you being exasperated, so YANBU there.

But I was in hospital a few weeks ago for the birth of my premature, ill DS, who was whisked off to SCBU after a c-section that wasn't planned until an hour before.

As I lay in bed on the post-natal ward without my baby, trying not to cry, the woman in the bed opposite kept whingeing that a doctor - possibly the same one off doing a crash section (they were waiting for the baby in SCBU) had promised to come and check her hours ago.

I wanted to scream at her.

So YABU in that there are other priorities - but not to blame exactly, because I didn't realise about any of this until it happened to me.

Let it go and enjoy your brand new baby. That's the important thing now.

YANBU but congratulations and enjoy your baby!
I had a similar experience after one of mine whereby we knew we could go, at say 6pm the paperwork had been done no drugs needed, we were waiting for the baby check which by now was about 6 hrs late, dh came up with our oldest and in the end they gave up and went to McDonalds, came back still waiting oldest fell asleep on bed, still waiting by now it became apparent to me that the reason we were waiting was that the Junior Doc in question was watching TV in one of the patients areas she proceeded to do this for over 1 hr waiting for her shift to end, when it ended and the next guy came on of course he went whereever first and then came in about 10 all apologetic!!

So we said oh don't apologise we know we are waiting because your colleague was watching TV perhaps you'd like to let the consultant in charge know that it was that obvious to the patients poor guy went scarlet

said the same to the community midwife the next day

however that's nothing compared to my most recent discharge, ward seemed entirley staffed by agency, they couldn't work the equipment, get drugs out of the locked cupboard, do the needed blood test, find the paperwork, one literally screamed at my midwife not to talk to me (because of the room I was in) they had no understanding of what was going on (so the only answer as far as they were concerned was to screw the whole thing up) then the woman on the desk tried to refuse to let my push the bassinet in my PJs accross to ICU, so they then suggested I stay another night and my poor dh who had waited about 12 hrs just go home, I had had nothing to eat or drink all day (they refused to give me anything) anyway we felt we needed to get out of there for our safety but not one midwife had the necessary code to open the doors
Thankfully I'd found the button the door lady used on a previous night foray but couldn't climb over the desk fast enough to push it and get through the door so we found another midwife (who incidentally had no idea who I was but was quite happy to let fully clothed me walk out with a baby) she didn't know where the button was so I climbed over pushed it climbed back and left all post-natally while she stood holding the door a bit open mouthed!!

That however was nothing compared to the medical care, we just felt lucky to get out.

YANBU

When I had my last child there was a similar issue around delayed discharge. I know that hospitals are busy places, but still I think that it is unreasonable to ask people to sit around for hours when it isnt necessary. Its also less efficient in the long run, as you then have people sitting in hospitals who dont need to be.

What I did was just to say that I was perfectly happy to go without my meds, and that I would get my DH to return to the ward later in the day to pick up the drugs (was just pain relief and I had some in the house anyway). That wasnt needed though, because the midwife then immediately went and got the drugs out of the cupboard on the ward and gave them to me, so not sure why they didnt just do hat in the first place.

YANBU. It always amazes me how long it takes to get discharged - they faff around for hours but once you've been told you can go you just want to go!! I think its inefficiency and they should get it sorted - yes I know they're busy but a bit of organisation wouldn't go amiss.

YANBU. I have exactly the same story from post DD birth. MWs missed how much blood I had lost and when I told them that I was feeling woozy, one midwife implied I was just being a wuss. All hell broke loose when blood test results came back and I was so dangerously anaemic that I needed 3 transfusions. When Doctor saw empty bed and asked MWs where I was, they couldn't find me because they had ordered me to go to the new mothers talk which meant staggering up the corridor wheeling my baby. Doctors were livid with the MWs for not listening to me. When I was finally discharged 2 days later, I was told I could go that morning, and eventually left at 6pm. As I say, I can understand where you're coming from but enjoy baby and don't let it wind you up. Congratulations! :)

It just seems strange on one hand that they take hours to discharge patients whilst on the other hand we are told that there is a lack of hospital beds.

YANBU. This is not uncommon.

Until you are discharged you still have a bed/need to be fed which seems like a waste of time and money to me.

There is a common attitude of 'think yourself lucky you and your dc are both ok'. Which is part of the reason standards of care can be so low. Its not unreasonable to expect to be d/c promptly, get home, get you and your new baby settled in and sort out other dc.

Gogo and Nellie, read my post above.
My dad was told mid-morning that he was being discharged. He had to leave his bed, and wait in the patients day-room until his drugs turned up, some six or more hours later, during which time he wasn't fed by the hospital (two mealtimes).

I am aware of what you went through JaquesTouatte - I said much the same earlier in the thread. The gentleman I was with was still very weak and had to give up his bed and wait for hours for the pharmacy to sort themselves out. The reasons we waited were that we kept being given false hope that the meds would arrive soon. Also it simply was not practical to go home and come back. This I know is not an isolated incident. In the end a nurse went down to pharmacy for us to hurry things up, for which we were very grateful.

Discharges are notorious for taking a long time. I waited THREE days after breaking my leg, was told I could be discharged on Monday and didn't get home until Wednesday. This was because of a muck up with hospital transport.

I think if you had reasonable care otherwise, you should count yourself very lucky and just enjoy your new baby :)

It sounds par for the course. I had a similar experience when I had my first child. I was told that they couldn't find a padeatrician and I waited for hours with no updates. Arrangements for our departure from hospital sped up significantly when I eventually lost patience and told the staff that I was discharging myself and my baby.

Thirty minutes later I was all checked out, baby checked and on my way home. I thoroughly recommend my way around the problem if there is no reason remain an inpatient.

no reason to remain an inpatient.

Thank you, I was BU to write angry in the title, as I'm not angry. The issue was indeed staffing, which must be indicative/symptomatic of the NHS today. I fully understand I was low priority; during my care I benefited from high priority, on the first night when DS was taken from me to NICU (and I sobbed my heart out all night as I really didn't understand why at the time) and as already mentioned when I eventually got my transfusion! And yes I wouldn't have given a damn who was waiting to go home.
I definitely had cabin fever yesterday and was just so desperate to leave it all seemed worse than it was. And my post this morning was written as I was turning events over in my mind whilst happily BF my lovely DS, so I haven't let it get to me. As for the labour/birth, I won't go there!

I assume there was no delay in your emcs? I think it is so unreasonable of them to delay some paperwork, they were probably doing other useless emergency procedures, delivering babies and saving lives. Useless NHS! We should pay more taxes so that there is a team of form fillers available for every need. If taxes were not enough for this admin army we should get rid of those useless midwives, cluttering up good wards which could be filled with clerks desks.

Or maybe you could hang on for a couple of hours in a free hospital that put your needs first when you needed them and are a little bit slow on filling out forms.

JB, you are almost as sarcastic as me. What you seem to fail to notice is that it is, in the vast majority of cases, completely unnecessary for a patient to be present for the paperwork to be filled out. They already know all the necessary details. As I said earlier, some hospitals can manage it.

Oh, and the NHS isn't free, I pay thousands of pounds a year for the privilege of having an NHS. It is free at the point of use, but that is a different thing.