to think something has got to be done about a&e waiting times

[McHappyPants2012]

in the last few days i have been to the hospital with my DD (aged 2) tuesday night was 5 hours and last night close to 6 hours.

Nothing will be done until the govt and we get to grips with the number of people who have accidents/ emergencies when they are drunk or on drugs and pitch up at a and e. next time you go (hopefully not in the near future) just ask a nurse how many of her hours she spent dealing with someone who was drunk or drugged. you will be shocked.

thats not a very long wait really, compared to many. What were you there for?

i have been a few time latley with my son -pre and post surgery. He was seen by a nurse within 10 minutes assesed then seen by a doctor - taken to cubicals within 1/2 an hour. Staff were brilliant - nominated sons nurse for award she was fabtastic with him!! Disney film on in the waiting room for the kids.

There was ALOT of parents who bring their kids to A&E with a cough/sore throat/ feeling poorly etc things IMO shouldbe for GP but after talking to some of the parents in waiting area most said it was easier to bring them to A&E and get anti b's than make an appointment with dr. and take time off work etc?

Should add our A&E has its own ped's department. ALthough the adult A&E still have triage and will see you within 10min of your arrival.

I tell you what would help

If people learnt to recognise a cough/cold is a totally normal thing for most children, and if NHS Direct stopped using the token response 'Take them to A&E'

I've lost count of the amount of times I've sat in A&E surrounded by coughing/snotty children who are otherwise very happy to run around the waiting room like mad things.

Emergency? I think not

she badly burnt the back of her foot.

I think if it was easier to get an appointment at your GPs and they ran more work friendly opening hours there'd be less people in a&e.

I'm the same system as everyone else - ring up after 8.30 if you want an appointment that day and they're all gone by 8.35.

Mc I don't think worra was being nasty to you, just a general statement!

i was responding to TheParanoidAndroid post :)

If NHS direct/mumsnet stopped telling people to go to A&E every 2 minutes it'd help.

Oops sorry!

I agree with Worra - the problem is the numbers of people who turn up at A&E when they don't need to be there. Oddly enough, I was there with ds on Wed afternoon (2 and 3/4hours from arrival to departure as you ask) and think it is marvellous the way the staff triage who needs to be seen more urgently than others, and the way they are so nice to everyone, regardless of how stupid their accident is. We are so lucky that we can just rock up to a hospital and be seen, without charge or worrying about how we are going to pay for it.
tbh, if there were some miraculous way of making it so you never waited more than 1/2 hour, it would probably then get even fuller with people who don't need to be there.

It's such a shame that NHS direct is as crap as it is. It has the potential to be a really useful service that could benefit a lot of people and do a lot to cut waiting times in GPs surgeries, A&E and OOH services. But it doesn't. I think the biggest problem is probably members of the public that have no common sense though. That and the far of being sued.

If people learnt to recognise a cough/cold is a totally normal thing for most children, and if NHS Direct stopped using the token response 'Take them to A&E'

What she said. Plus, if GP surgeries were open when working people are not at work, it would really help.

All the (many) A&E's I was in with young kids tend to triage the kids, 5-6 hours is a long time to wait

I spent 8 hours in A&E with DS who had a broken arm. We got there at 3pm, but kept getting pushed to the bottom of the list due to more urgent cases. Fair enough. But after 5pm there was only one radigrapher on duty for the whole hospital. He didn't get his arm Xrayed till 11pm.

This was several years ago. I hope things have improved a bit.

Once the fracture was confirmed, he got his plaster cast on fairly quickly.

Just to clarify, it was a fracture that a lay person could have diagnosed from 20 feet away - so no doubt of the diagnosis.

Sorry to hear about our DD's burn.

How quickly were you triaged? My view is that provided they triage you reasonably quickly then the wait time is just what it is. The trouble with A&E is you never see what else is going on - it may look empty where you are but you can't see the 3 nasty car crashes, 2 heart attacks, 1 fit and perhaps a case of anaphylaxis that have all come in since then.

Waiting is horrible, especially if you're worried about a child - I've got it down to a fine art now in terms of grabbing a bag with books/Nintendo/drinks etc as appropriate, it does mean the time goes a bit less slowly.

3littlefrogs they still need to x-ray though to see how the bones etc are lying and assess if they need pinning etc.

We are lucky in that we have a paediatric A&E but I'm not sure if it's open 24 hours. I've tried to keep away from A&E by going to the walk-in minor injuries clinic but at least 60% of the time they have said "Go to A&E".

Yes - I do know that and understood the reason the Xray was needed. But I felt that one radiographer from 5pm to 9 am for a DGH was a bit poor.

Also, we were sat in the waiting room with all the aforementioned drunks. Poor DS was in agony, but not allowed any pain relief in case he needed an anaesthetic. Again, fair enough, but a bit harsh on a 10 year old.

I have similar experience to 3littlefrogs. I took DD to A&E with a broken leg, we waited 4 hours to be seen and then another 3 for her to be x-rayed. During that time (despite being in agony) all she was offered was Calpol. (after her x-ray they put her on maximum dosage of multiple painkillers). I accept that she was not a life-threatening case, but thought the way she was handled was really poor - better triage or more staff or something ... is needed.

about 20 minutes.

well today i am going to pack a hospital emergency bag

Something that works at the weekend is to have a 'field hospital' in the city centre to weed out all the people with minor injuries and/or alcohol poisoning. I'm a nurse and sometimes a radiographer is required on our unit at night. Sometimes on weekend nights we (and therefore the patient) have a long wait for someone to come up because they're so busy in A&E. On 'black Friday', however, my patient needed an X-ray and the radiographer was up straight away. I was surprised, but she said it was because there was a field hospital in town so A&E was actually fairly quiet - I assume that many of the people who normally come in had been seen to by paramedics away from the hospital so that genuine emergencies could be taken in.

And I agree about maybe gp surgeries being open more in the evenings, and better facilities for children - when dd hurt her foot last year we were expected to wait in main A&E not the children's one because it was full of adult patients waiting for a bed! That is completely unacceptable IMO. The problem there I assume is all the cutting of staff and beds on other wards

If people are paying for NHS services out of their pay every month they have every right to go to the hospital if they feel poorly.

I think it depends where you live but 5-6 hours is very long.

I've taken ds2 to A&E about 10 times and the waiting times ranged from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours. Our local hospital had separate children's and adult A&E (is this standard?)

If the GP had been open then I would have gone to the see the nurse for some of those visits (he needed stitches for deep gashes). I agree that longer GP surgery times would relieve pressure on A&E and I'm assuming it's cheaper too?