to expect to be able to find a doctor to see a child, in the uk, closer than 15 miles and less than a 4 hour wait?

[SheelaNeGig]

Shes actually not ill as such but does have spreading infected skin rash. (but imagine if she was ill?)

And 15 miles and 4 hours wait away isn't a Doctor but a triage nurse. I think it needs more than a nurse prescriber considering the fucidin isn't working and she can't take anything orally. But not ill enough to endure a 4 hour wait.

The NHS is in trouble isn't it.

Nobody should have to travel 15 miles or wait more than 4 hours to see a doctor? So you want doctors to be all over the UK open 24 hours a day? What bout rural areas, there should be round the clock doctors dotted around the countryside on the offchance someone needs attention at 4am on a sunday on a remote farm?

You are being ridiculous, and unbearably entitled.

But flow when you compare to some that go in then that won't be life threatening just painful. Waiting isn't good but it also won't be the top priority for the staff when they have established their is no immediate risk to the limb.

I have just been to a and with with DS in and out in 2 hours with the treatment he needed. Others in there waited longer but DS was struggling to breathe therefore couldnt wait

Oh absolutely, sirzy :) I hold on to the perhaps naive belief that we were kept waiting so long because someone in greater need was being treated. But the waiting room was full of people with ailments I wouldn't have even taken to a doctor, let alone A&E, and I can't help thinking that if they'd looked after themselves, my son would have had his arm treated sooner. The triage process didn't work for us either, because they didn't give him any pain relief, which was his most urgent need. :(

That's bad :( our hospital give pain relief in triage if needed

And in our extensive wait at a+e, ds did have breathing problems, but did he need his sats taken, straight away, oh no because he didn't present as child with breathing difficulties!

Once DH broke his wrist and went to A and E at 9am on a Sunday morning. It was completely empty, utterly completely empty, and he still had to wait an hour!

hazey You seem to be taking this personally. Your son was clearly ill and was treated badly. People do time waste terrible in A&E and OOH and this is what slows down genuine needs.

Incidentally, I don't think children should be made to wait as long as adults.

Here in Shropshire Shropdoc is available whenever surgeries are closed. If serious they will visit or they will see you at a local clinic or will give excellent phone advice. It is staffed by a rota of local GP's.

No, seriously, they had managed to clear it. I know because I had a snoop around (I work there sometimes so know my way around the back).

It was like the Marie Celeste.

In support of the op I have been to A and E more than a few times with a
seriously sick child (urosepsis and breathing difficulties with oxygen levels in the 70s ) and waited hours to be seen. Both times my son was admitted for over a week. Both times I begged for him to be looked at earlier and have since discovered the a and e nurse wrote to my GP saying I was anxious and aggressive. I have also had the same a and e refuse to let me take my dd with a temp of 42 outside to cool down but made me wait 2 hours for paracetamol.
Belive it or not some departments are shocking. I also work in the NHS op so perhaps we have greater insight into how things should be?

I think it's a bit of a cop-out, this myth that everyone is always being pushy and that patients are seen in a sensible order, and if patients were, well, more patient, it would all be fine and dandy. I think it comes from the British desire to queue incessantly, and ascribe moral attributes to the art of queuing.

It has to be said that many staff members in A and E certainly see the worst of human nature, and I admire them for everything they have to do. But there are certainly also groups within departments who are fairly hopeless at managing demand, unless they are properly supervised, and are happy to sit out of sight of the patients doing as little as possible, if they think nobody is about to pop their clogs and there are unlikely to be repercussions.

I've seen this, just as I have seen them being told off for it as well. I've also seen people (usually the quiet and polite elderly) collapse in the waiting room because members of staff just couldn't be bothered to do their jobs properly.

I'd be very interested to know where you've seen these things boffin, I'm an A&E nurse and where I work this wouldn't even vaguely be tolerated. We have about half the staff and half the resources we need, because of this care is often less than we'd like to give but hand on heart not one person shirks or doesn't do something because they 'can't be bothered'.

Featherbag, I have seen them with my work hat on, but it wasn't well tolerated there either and they got a telling off. That having been said, I think there is always the tendency for things to slip back if the SMT have their eye off the ball. And interestingly, I am aware there was a problem with a particular team of midwives in the nearby maternity hospital basically doing the same thing in their area as well. They were all disciplined in the end, I think.

Oh yes, and this was a top teaching hospital as well.