Piss take waiting in A&E for an very very long time,

[SubwayAllTheWay]

I had a very sore neck, couldnt move it and was getting shooting pains every 5 mins. As I was near the hospital, I went in at 11am today. I was seen at 3pm. So i had to wait for nearly four hours with shooting pains to the point I had to leave the A&E reception to shout out my pain.

AIBU that this time takes the mick? I know ambulances have priority but If it takes that long, I would have phoned for an ambulance because then atleast i would get seen early.

It took the piss because there were people who seemed to be happy, able to walk but a sore wrist and they got seen after an hour of being there.

I didnt go to the doctors as i was in so much pain i thought i might faint and A&E seemed better idea as they could do a scan and find out the cause.

I think most people would get fed up waiting so long, I know I can get irritiable when I'm in pain or upset. But I thought it was common knowledge that there can be waiting times of several hours in A&E sometimes, and you don't really know the details of anyone else's situation. I doubt they were keeping you waiting just for fun.

Having a child unfortunately doesn't get you seen any quicker, nor should it (just like it doesn't get you to the front of the taxi queue!)

Don't get why if you genuinely believed you were having a stroke you would decide not to bother with the scan and just go home, that doesn't sound likely. And if you thought it was a life-threatening situation, surely you would have tried to contact your family/DD's father?

flippin nora!

I get trapped nerves in my back and it is sometimes so bad that i can't actually move one foot in front of the other without using a computer chair as a zimmer frame. I get pains shooting down the front and backs of my legs, have to helped onto the toilet and need help wiping and have to helped up again!

Not once has it ever crossed my mind to go to a&e!!

Should've gone to a chiro if it was that bad, would've taken a fraction of the time spent at a&e.

I went to A&E on a Sunday night as I'd shut my knee in the car door. I thought it was a bit swollen. Turns out it had a blood clot in it.

But I also went to A&E in the middle of the night because I was having a severe gall bladder attack. I waited around 4 hours for them to admit me. Then another 3 days for surgery and sometimes you just have to be patient.

If it bothered you so badly you would have waited for your scan.

How do you know what was wrong with others?

If I thought I was having a stroke I would dial 999 ...after a nurse had assessed me and I knew it wasn't a (highly unlikely) stroke (given I had no symptoms of a stroke) I would leave - go to Boots (or any other chemist) and buy some Ibruprofen

that does not make me a saint - it makes me sensible

To get something sorted in a day isn't a long wait if it's a non emergency and you are suffering no other affects than soreness. It IS a long time with a 2 year old and yes, I'd have ended that day very stressed and probably pissed off.

However, I drove my children to hospital last night at 2am because I suspected/was concerned about meningitis... my 5 yr old had been violently sick and had developed an awful looking rash on his face. He was seen within minutes of arrival at A+E, and kept under observation until 6am. We were all tired, all cranky, all fed up, and it was a false alarm but had the hospital not prioritised, and had my son actually had meningitis and had you been seen before him, I would have been more then fed up.

A sore neck is horrid, but not life threatening in itself, and you were seen.

All these posters complaining i shouldnt have gone to A&E for trapped nerve, i have never had one before, never had such pain so i wouldnt have known what it was.

If i had known what was wrong with me, i would have googled/ gone to the pharmacy to get my meds.

Yes, im definately a very entitled person, going to A&E.

Glad you've realised you wasted precious time and resources in A&E and will behave differently in future.

Subway - I can understand you going to A&E if you thought you were having a stroke, yes.
But when you got there and were first assessed they would have known you were not having a stroke. Had you been displaying signs of a stroke (or indeed a heart attack, which is actually what you might have if you have shooting pains in your chest and down arms - not neck) then they would have done something very quickly.

Did they explain that you would have a long wait? I agree that that might have helped. NO WAY would I go to A&E with a child if I could help it. It must have been awful.

But once they knew you were not having a stroke or a heart attack or anything like that - which they can assess at triage, then you were dealt with fairly within the A&E system.

Have a google of the symptoms of stroke - in case anything like this happens again. They had ads on the TV - it's inability to move parts of the body, slurring of speech, collapse...not pain at all, I don't think.

I hiope your trapped nerve recovers fast.

It is possible that the sprains etc were seen by nurse practitoners on a "Minor Injuries " basis. Presumably your neck pains sounded more like a doctor needed to see you, so you had to wait, and would not have been prioritised as urgent, particularly as you were able to make a fuss.
Don't you know that (for instance) in a major incident, that the people making most noise are triaged further down than the ones who are quiet, because the quiet ones are the ones in serious trouble! If you can make noise you aren't dying. You should have waited for your scan though.
I am sure you know someone who could have come to be with you and help take care of your daughter,or to take her from you...what did you think you would do with her if you went in for your scan??? Presumably you think a member of staff could be called away from what they were doing to look after her?

No to subway who seems to know everyone else going in only had sprains.

If you really thought it was a stroke, you would have phoned 999, not drove your car with a young child in it.

As an aside, re patients with sprain wrists etc walking in before you, where I work there are nurse practioners who can deal with these things but who may not deal with neck pain. So, it is the appropriate triage and also when the appropriate person is able to deal with it.

Our A&E is under threat of closure - why? Because 60% of people who access it don't need to be there and it is unaffordable. By making access more difficult (i.e. Travel to neighbouring towns) it is hoped that people will use more appropriate and cost-effective services- GPs, OOHs, pharmacies etc. The result will be that those truly in need of life-saving treatment will have farther to travel.

SubwayAllTheWay how are you now?

YABU. A stroke is like a heart attack in the brain. There is no way you'd have been able to get yourself and a two year old to hospital under your own steam if you'd had one. We're not saints but you're a blimmin' drama queen/hypochondriac.

I've had the trapped nerve with the pains down my arm as well and I know exactly how painful it is. I'm not going to comment on whether YABU or not, everyone else seems to have done that very well! But in case you're still getting the pains...
Put your arm in a sling. Make it out of a scarf if you have to, just to take the weight off & make it slightly less painful.
Try Voltarol. You might need to get it prescribed though, its been a while since I took it or you might be able to get it from the pharmacist. It worked for me.
When you go to bed put a cushion under your elbow and keep the arm in a sling if you need to.
HTH

just to be helpful for future reference

Purity

YABU
Nice drip-feeding too

Ok, Anyone want my statistics?

A and E admissions 289

1 for a thriple compound fracture on the ankle plaster for 6 months from my hip to 6 inches in front of my toes (I have bones with never heal) wait was 6 hours to be seen by a doctor, but a nurse saw me in under 2 hours, said it was clearly a break, she filled out the forms, got the doctor to sign them and had me off to xray and on pain killers. Reason for wait, it was a sunday evening and there was loads of drunks in from the bank holiday weekend. Age 13.

1 refered from GP for a major injury to the hand / wrist that had beem missed by minor injuries the week early, time in A and E 30mins to surgey time in surgey 18hours, Age 11

1 for renal colic and kindey stones, Very bad pain, I´m on morphine due to a back injury, was seen within 30mins discharge 10hours later

1 ambulance from seen of car accident, spinal board etc, with chronic asthama attach due to fracture of the ribs and collar bone, waiting time in resus 30mins due to someone that was being treated for suspected heart attach

1 referal from NHS direct due to lung collapse and double pneumonia (sp) due to asthama attach which had been on going for 3 days. home nebulisers where not clearing.

1 "driven by friend" blue in the face stop breathing in the car, triage nurse asked 2 questions, and pushed my wheel chair straight through into resus.

1 referal from wednesday emergency GP clinic for server asthama, I drove to the GP´s having phoned and aske permisson to come in to the emergency clinic, big que and I waited my turn, eventually cyanotic, the GP took me out of the que and sent to the "people with colds" home and called an ambulance

1 for Atrial fibrillation I think it was called very fast heart beat where the heart needed to be reset, was diagnosed by the GP, and I was sent to A and E with an admission letter

1 due to allegic complication to antibiotics and infection in heart which landed me in the CCU, for 6 weeks, and I waited over 6 hours due to a mutliple car pile up.

250 admissions under blues and twos due to server near fatal asthama attacks / status epileptics that resulted in stays over 1 weeks in ICU. Waiting time in a and e upto 36 hours befor a bed came avaliable in ICU, yes I was clogging up a resus bed but there was no where else sutiable to put me at the time.

32 admissions in ambulance for asthama attacks / status epileptics that resulted in stays in HDU and MAU.

Number of breaks that have been treated by minor injuries 52
Number of Asthama Attachs Treated by minor injuries 651

Age now 31.

Its A and E, if bones arn´t broken, if blood is not gushing, and you can say your own name, can breath, speak and are concious.

You didn´t need to be there, simple as!

As for not waiting for the scan, well that was stupid.

Not only where you totally unreasonable, the only one that took the piss was you. Personally a 4 hour wait for a non injury when you just couldn´t think where else to go would be a walk in the park for a lot of people that really needed that care. I have listen to people like you complaining in A and E about that "young girl" how came in via the ambulance getting seen first.

So are you saying that you had to wait 4 hours before you we're seen by anyone at all?

You are saying that you've never had a trapped nerve before, but have you had a stroke before?

I really am struggling to see why you think you were having a stroke. Maybe if you has googled the symptoms of a stroke, you would have realised you were being a numpty.