Should I complain? Hospital related

[MrsPotts18]

Sorry this is long but I'll try to be brief. I'm so confused.

• last Sun became unwell around 5pm with what I thought was gastro bug. Vomiting, spasms etc. Managed until 1.30am when I got a sharp pain in my right hand side and was in agony. Took more painkillers but was worse by 2.30am so went to triage (30weeks pregnant)

• got the by 2.45am and was seen immediately. Bloods done and seen by midwives. Dr eventually came after 2hrs as they were v busy and initially thought gallstones. Got adequate pain relief at this point as was in agony. CTG on baby was great thankfully.

-6am was transferred to antenatal ward. Slept on and off all day and was on morphine, dihydrocodeine and paracetamol at this point. Various bloods ran all day and was suspected gallstones and ?cholestasis. Had ultrasound Monday pm which showed normal gallbladder/liver.

Tuesday Am rounds consultant comes and says she's discharging me. Says the pain on my right side is pulled muscles from being sick and I've had a gastro bug. I'm still being sick at this point but only after very small meals. She says CRP (infection markers) are 168. Anything over 100 would suggest bacterial but she def thinks I've been unlucky with a gastroenteritis infection. Tuesday night I beg to stay as I'm still in horrendous pain and cannot eat at this point. Reg agrees. I ask for antibiotics and was told 'can't find original source of infection so what's the point'. I'm too weak to discuss more.

-Wednesday 1.30am. I wake up in total again. I was sobbing and couldn't breathe. Midwives get SHO who refuses to call consultant. I beg for pain relief or to be knocked out. Pain was only on my right side under ribcage again. They tried for 6hours to get blood from me. 28 attempts later (even from my feet) only 1 was successful. Refused to call anaesthetist or senior dr. 8am and SHO finally decides to call the surgeon.

-Wednesday 9am. Surgeon comes. Spends 5 mins with me and I'm in MRI with surgeon personally doing it by 10am. Was told by 10.45am my appendix has perforated and I have pus pockets everywhere. CRP is now at 268 and I need to go to theatre. Everyone is worried and preparing for c section as told early labour is almost guaranteed. By 1.30pm I'm in theatre. Overhead brief conversation between surgeon and obstetrics and he told them it was basic negligence but I can't be sure of exact conversation

Thursday - in HdU. Finally round from op but GA has aggravated my asthma and I'm really ill. Baby is thankfully amazing and didn't need to do a c section. Staff in HDU are amazing!!!

Today spent all day in HDU due to no bowel sounds but finally got those moving. Kidney function returned to normal. Now back on original antenatal ward.

Had a slight debrief with surgical team (im still a little out of it). Had an open appendectomy and have 24 staples in situ. Op that was meant to be an hour was 3.5 due to complications. My appendix was black and gangrenous and the infection had spread much further. They had to go into my bowel too and repair due to infection.

The surgeons have been amazing. I have never felt so safe since they came on board Wednesday morning. But from Sunday night to that point I feel neglected. Things wouldn't have got this bad if they had run the appropriate blood tests or even called the right team. On the other hand should o just be grateful that I was got to in time and my baby is healthy. It could be so much worse and all I keep hearing is how lucky I am. I'm so emotional tonight hence this post and just need a hand hold I think.

Use your voice! Shout hour after hour if you need something, make it really clear like “I’m in horrific pain, I need my medication.” 2 mins later “I need my pain medication.” “Where’s my pain medication, I’ve been asking for over 5 minutes and am in chronic pain” and so on.
Ask for a copy of all of your notes. Really demand them. Properly moan at the nurses until they give them to you. Check they’re correct then give them to your husband. Then;
Ask your husband and your mother to inform the nurses that you will be making an official complaint regarding their negligent behaviour towards you. Get them to properly have a go at scaring the nurses stiff. You can demand to be allowed a private room (tell them you fear for your mental health and they should find one pretty sharpish - I suffered with horrific pnd because they didn’t give me a private room after I had number 1.) and that way your husband can stay with you overnight.
If none of this is a possibility and you still feel awful and their treatment is still abhorrent, tell the nurses that yourself.
Demand, shout, scream, press the buzzer whenever you can, yell louder, make yourself a real pain and they will quickly start dancing attendance when they realise other patients can hear you carrying on.

What an appalling experience, so glad you and the baby are out of danger.

Excellent advice from Arrietty and others above; also here is info on how to complain. NHS complaints procedure

Also get in touch with your local Healthwatch and copy everything to them.

Be very clear about what the undeniable issues are which from what I can see are a) missed diagnosis (not good, but can happen) b) failure to escalate following deterioration (bad and dangerous) c) poor post-op care both clinical and compassion (bad and dangerous). There may be more - I'm just guessing. But if you can keep it clean and crisp it makes it easier to make a sharp complaint.

Also useful question is - what are you as a hospital doing to make sure nobody else has to go through this?

You MUST complain - this is negligence pure and simple.

I once complained for similar reasons (but a different problem) and it all boiled down to not listening to the patient. They would not listen to me when I explained the severity of the pain; just dismissed it. I had to seek a second opinion privately to get the right diagnosis.

When OH was practising medicine they listened to the patient, looked and examined and did not simply rely on tests results as they do now - although your test results were shouting infection loud and clear.

I am so glad that you have survived!- and your baby!

Not usually one to complain and I had my own appendix fiasco last year.

However, in THIS case, damn right you should complain about your treatment . You could very well have died, they are now ignoring your pain relief requests, complain, loudly , legally ,

When I was in there was a leaflet about how to make an official complaint on the wall as you left the ward . See if they have any in your hospital OP

And also , glad to hear your baby is doing just fine .

When you come out make a Subject Access Request for your notes under the GPDR. There's a suggested request letter and advice on the Information Commissioner's office website.

Do complain. Best of luck with your recovery

Is there a pals office in the hospital? I don't know if it would be staffed on a weekend but I would get your husband to go and see them face to face. Ask them to visit you on the ward and witness the lights, buzzer etc. They should be able to advocate for you whilst you are still being cared for and guide you through making a complaint. If you don't feel up to making the complaint now then writing a clear timeline of your experience is sensible while its fresh in your mind and may help you process some of the trauma.

I wish you a speedy recovery and hope the rest of your pregnancy is smooth sailing.

I'm gobsmacked that appendicitis wasn't thought of straight away.

You have been treated appallingly.

toffee that’s dreadful advice!

Trying to get her husband to properly scare the nurses will result in security being called. They can’t give her access to the other notes off their own back and it’s awful to try and bully someone to do so. There are no magic private rooms just waiting to be utilised.

Having said that, I certainly wouldn’t wait till I got home to make a complaint. If you have cell reception, ring PALS and/or ask to speak to the matron/site manager. I’d ask if the surgical team would be happy for transfer to surgical ward with midwives doing daily/twice daily checks. You’d then get the best post op care from surgical nurses with an on-hand surgical team coupled with midwifery keeping an eye on you.

Of course you should complain and start now re the substandard care you are already receiving. Send a brief note about that to the ceo this morning. Their name and add @nhs.net. Ask to see the Head of Nursing/Women & Children's services now, also request to see lead consultant for obs before you are discharged and insist upon consultant led care for the rest of the pg.

IMO if you start kicking up a fuss now, you will get tip top care from now because they absolutely will not dare put further feet wrong.

I hope you are feeling better soon

Many many things wrong here. You should really be being cared for in a surgical ward. You main problem isnt related to your pregnancy. Midwives are very good at maternity care. But as you have discovered have minimal skills outside this. If you had a broken leg etc you would be on ortho not maternity. They have portable ctg, and can come check on baby and your pregnancy on a regular basis.
You should still be under dual care, the surgical team should be keeping an eye on you.
Speak to PALS, while you are there, especially as you are still having on going issues and don't feel safe. They can help.
The 28 blood draw attempts is appalling. 2 or 3 each then go higher.
It might sound silly but start writing down everything now, it's easy to forget little things. It also helps you focus in on the issues you feel most strongly about.
Glad baby is well and hope the rest of your recovery is uneventful.

This is exactly why I advise anyone who is fortunate to be able to afford to do so- to get private medical care. The NHS are becoming so negligent and it is affecting people like yourself so badly

elephant14 Totally agree they need a good kick up the arse and any poor practice exposed for it is. There may be other factors at play here that we don’t know about, but when I talk about learning I mean that for all staff working in that area so that other women don’t have this experience, not just the staff involved. They need to look at the practice and processes and amend them.

Re: managing unwell adults, of course any HCP should manage pain, basic shit like call bells being to hand I didn’t infer that they shouldn’t - midwives often don’t recognise the signs of a deteriorating adult, I have first hand experience of this, that is what I meant. I’m not saying it’s right, in fact I think it’s utterly ridiculous and unsafe BUT they should have access/training to understanding signs and understanding escalation processes even if they wouldn’t know what is causing the woman to be unwell, in pain etc.

You’re not making a complaint against an individual who made one mistake. This is a catalogue of disaster and mismanagement, start to finish. Missed opportunities which could have resulted in you and your baby being one of those “we must learn from this tragic incident” stories. Even now, you’re in the wrong ward being nursed by expert midwives who haven’t done general surgery in a long time. The principles are the same of course but, again you’re in danger of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. And no fucking buzzer! I’m an ex nursing (staff nurse to senior sister) of 26 years. This is a mess. You should allow your DH to handle this initially so that you can regain some strength and recover.

My god please complain. Nurse here. CRP 168 is very high and you should've had IV antibiotics. Your white cells would've been through the roof. Horrendous. thank god you and baby are ok.

Most definitely complain. I’d get your husband to email and tweet whoever he can to bring attention to your treatment . It is completely unacceptable to move your buzzer out of reach and not help you

Toffee, that advice is just about the worst advice you could give! What would it achieve? Certainly not more care from an already overstretched service! The ward she is now on is not the same where she stared, the staff may well be different due to changes of shift patterns. What people are seeming to forget, particularly the person who pointed out that in the USA you could, sue the pants off the hospital, is that here we get FREE healthcare, the NHS is drastically understaffed, junior doctors may well have worked for 48 hours straight so are highly likely to go with the obvious and miss the rare.
Yes, it sounds like things have been missed, but actually reading between the lines, it also sounds like DM and MIL may have stuck their noses in and made a stink. Appendicitis usually starts with a dull aching pain in the lower abdomen, not just on one side, accompanied by V+D. The initial symptoms you describe don't sound like this. I know because I had a ruptured appendix when I too was 7 months pregnant.
You say you had many different painkillers but could hear a conversation in surgery between the surgeon and other staff. Not possible, you are anaesthetised in pre op and do not go into surgery until unconscious. Surgeons are not allowed in the pre op room. You were most likely very out of is on pain relief therefore very confused.

By all means complain using the appropriate procedure, I did when my father was in hospital. It wasn't about the staff, but about the system. This may also be the case. Just remember, if it wasn't for the NHS the care you have had so far wouldn't have cost you approx ten thousand pounds!

What should the hospital have done differently to correctly diagnose the appendicitis sooner? I read that imaging is required, would that be complicated by the large uterus? NHS page.

You should complain directly to your surgical consult and if at all possible do it yourself rather than getting DH to advocate for you.

Raise all your current issues so that they have the chance to offer the obv solution of moving you to a surgical ward. I would keep the past issues on the backburner for now and focus on inadequacy of current care - however I do absolutely think you should be putting the steps in place for complaining about that once you are home.

I had similar issue at student changeover time with inexperienced midwifery staff reluctant to care for well baby not early / unwell enough for neonatal but too early for discharge. Be firm and calm and specific re your concerns. In my case I got instant transfer to private room and all medical care being given by senior neonatal staff. MW staff were still resentful however and I ended up discharging myself as soon as I was able.

I'm puzzled by the surgeon doing the MRI. They don't do MRIs.

I'm really sorry this has happened to you, it's disgraceful.

Your treatment is a joke OP, don't be grateful, be angry

I could not agree with this more.

There is nothing to be grateful for that they let you deteriorate so badly before they finally deigned to do what should have happened in the beginning.

Just because it's the NHS does not mean that the one competent thing they did in the midst of this horror show means you owe them your everlasting gratitude. You do not.

They should be fucking ashamed of how they treated you and are still treating you.

I'm puzzled by the surgeon doing the MRI. They don't do MRIs. Well maybe he was doing it in his spare time for laugh, whatever, thank god someone did something.

As to see the consultant MW and her husband to speak to PALS. If they have separate rooms request to be moved to one.

I hope you're ok. It all sounds terrifying and thank goodness baby is ok.
I'm so pleased you have people to support you and wishing you a fast recovery.