To think the hospital could do a bit more?

[EyeSpyaBlueFoot]

Had to bring DS1 and DS5 with me to AE because I dropped a kitchen appliance on my foot from a great height last night. It turned all sorts of colours and looked like a cartoon foot this morning.

We waited 2.5 hours and I had to change DS1s nappy. Told the receptionist in case my name was called. Came back out and checked with her it hadn't been called. After another hour I ask how much longer they think it might be to be told I'd missed my name being called and I'll have to start again in the queue. Not a word of apology from the receptionist. Two hours later we are called in to have my foot X-ray. I now have very grumpy fed up small kids. X-ray tech is using as few words as possible and simply points and says they have to stay behind the wall. I completely agree but how? I try bribing the little one with snacks but he's 1 and keeps coming to me. X-ray tech getting irritated. DS5 trying his best to pin DS1 but it's just not happening and DS5 has autism so this is no small asknof him. Eventually the tech, without giving me the choice, takes the X-rays with both kids stood behind the bed (I couldn't see them and thought DS5 had manage to pin DS1). AIBU unreasonable to think we could have expected a tiny bit more help or is that standard?

Before anyone asks DH is on a business trip in another country and no one else could come with me.

I wonder how many people who make crazy suggestions would actually carry them out

Potentially if op had told her husband of the accident first thing this morning, he would have had time to make arrangements to come home ASAP. Which would mean op could potentially have requested a late fracture clinic appointment.

But husbands are often given a free pass while wife/mother has to muddle on regardless.

I understand there are times when partners can't get home straight away. It doesn't mean they shouldn't get there as soon as possible.

How did you get there or home?! Which bones are broken? I've been there sadly and I know how hard it is - managed to break foot when DD was 1 and wrist when she was 3! I know hindsight is a wonderful thing but the only way to get down the stairs is on your bum, so may as well have dragged the buggy down with you.

A&E prioritise on injury after the triage nurse has seen you, not on the children you brought with you.

X-rays need doing from a few different manipulated positions to get the complete view. Did she come back every time to change the machines position and ignore your children for possibly up to 3 times whilst she stood back and took the picture?

Our hospital - a general, very stretched bog standard NHS would not have even allowed the children in.

What's your prognosis OP? Do you have a boot or a cast? Crutches? Did you manage to get the children to bed okay?

Just read this thread and found most responses to OP to be quite harsh, especially those along the line of 'you should have got a baby sitter / tried harder to find one - they should have been left to X, Y or Z'. Much easier said than done, especially without knowing OP's circumstances. Reading her post, I could understood her position quite well: I moved to a new city recently. I don't know any of my neighbors (yet). I have absolutely no friend around, not even within a 100 km radius. I have absolutely no family I can rely upon either (the closest family member lives 5 hours away by car and is disabled). And my partner is often abroad for his work, so when he is, I am totally on my own with my two small children (4 and 2.5). If anything happened and if I had to go to the hospital, I could not find a baby sitter within a few hours, no matter how hard I tried (and the OP did try). Add the actual date of OP's misfortune to the mix: mid August, many people are away on holiday - all my close neighbors certainly are, and so are all the school parents… So sure, my children, my responsibility, but I don't see how the OP was irresponsible to take them with her on this particular occasion - she had no other choice, and yes, sometimes, it really is the case.
Re the pushchair, or lack thereof, I can also sympathize with the OP, even though I would have tried really hard to take it, which it seems the OP did. Sometimes, it is just easier to put a one year old in a babycarrier.
Most of the answers just focused on defending the NHS, saying that it was overstretched and that staff should 'focus on the job'. Well, on this occasion, it performed rather poorly with the OP. The receptionist made a mistake, which can certainly happen, but one that she did not even bother to recognize or acknowledge, while it meant at least two more hours of waiting for the OP. While it is not the radiologist's 'responsibility' to deal with OP's children, it is also true that he/she could have acted a bit more compassionately, and thus made things a bit easier for everyone. To end up saying that the OP is 'lucky (the X-ray) was done at all' struck me as being typical of too many comments pertaining to any story involving the NHS. Granted, it is overstretched, but it should not mean that it is standard to make mistakes, or to show a lack of professionalism (receptionist) or compassion (X-ray tech). One has the right to demand more. In fact, because it is the NHS, and because British people are, rightly, viscerally attached to what it stands for, one has a right to expect the best care, no matter the circumstances. And like some posters stressed, it is indeed exactly what one gets on many, many occasions, including with small, tired and feral children on your side…

imnotreally that is kind of the point obliquely. The treatment for broken foot is rest, strapping and painkillers generally. More of a GP / minor injuries unit situation than a trip to A&E.

Please don't go to the GPs with a possible broken foot, for goodness sake. loon.

If there's time, I'll hold a patient's baby, print a toddler off a colouring page and a biro to colour in with (budget cuts mean this is the most fun I can provide) or discreetly point a frazzled mum in the direction of the in house pharmacy where they sell lollipops

Very occasionally, when (for example) mum has booked online in her name because you're not allowed to book online for children, and then comes to me to change the appointment to the child's name, I'll forgot to check them in at the same time. I'll notice this within a few minutes, and send an apologetic message to the doc. They'll always see them.

99% of my colleagues are absolutely lovely. That's the NHS we should be proud of. Kindness takes seconds, and apologising and learning from mistakes should be paramount. Appreciate it might be different in A&E, but several of my friends work in A&E and they would all act much more compassionately in the situations you describe.

Im sorry but I’m not sure this quite adds up, to be honest. There is no way a radiographer is going to take an X-ray with unscreened children in the room. They risk their jobs and registration by so doing. It would have to be reported as an IRMER incident and investigated both within the trust and externally. The risks are just too high.

This sounds like a nightmare. I really feel for you. Your husband needs to come home. You can't care for the children with a broken foot.

I agree your treatment was poor. I would also be complaining very loudly about the children being exposed.

Broken foof 😂😂😂😂

Oh dear 💐 what a nightmare day you've had!

I do think the staff could have done more, it would have taken less time if they'd helped you. I have been in a similar situation & someone made ds a rattle out of a urine sample bottle and some paper clips .

Please don't miss your appt. it's important you get treated and if the swelling is severe you may be risk of developing a blood clot. Maybe call a taxi and explain you will need the driver to carry a pushchair for you and put it in the boot.

I was wondering that too CherryPavlova - although it is actually the distance from the X-ray machine that dictates whether someone is irradiated rather than whether they are behind a screen, which is why it is permitted to take X-rays on a hospital ward or in the operating theatre, where there are no screens.

And just for the record, people who take X-rays in the UK are known as radiographers, not X-ray techs.

YABU. When I broke my leg, it was hanging off but I still walked 56 miles to my GP surgery because I didn’t want to use A&E in a non emergency situation. I took all 8 of my children, including the triplets who were under 3 weeks old. If I can do it, anyone can.

Alternatively, YANBU to expect some compassion and I’m so sorry you broke your foot. You must be in so much pain and you really need to go to this appointment. I hope your husband can come home. Take care.

I'm going against the majority here, as a current nhs worker (nurse) I think you should have been offered more support. Yes the nhs is busy, understaffed etc etc. I get it. I deal with it every day I'm in work but I also think someone could have helped you. Hope you get better soon.

Ouch, OP! When you book the taxi for tomorrow, could you ask if they'll carry the pushchair down the stairs for you? Failing that, maybe you could ask a neighbour to bring it down? Once it's down the stairs, it could help your foot by acting like a zimmer frame?

Baby in push chair, older son distracted by phone/tablet/book and good old fashioned bribery? 'if you stay behind the screen you can have a happy meal on the way home'

I called the fracture clinic who told me that I could bring the kids but they can't help with them so I tried to change the appointment. The receptionist told me they don't reschedule them and that I need to go to my GP to be referred back to the fracture clinic which is just grand seeing as I haven't even registered us with a GP yet. So tomorrow I will try to register us with the GP and see if they will refer me back and by then DH will be home. Hopefully she wouldn't have been so willing to let me just leave it if the break was that bad? Or she has no clue and was just happy to have one less patient on the list for tomorrow. Who knows. I have no fight left. Just none. The pain is doing my head all the way in. DS with autism was an absolute star today but I won't get lucky two days in row asking him to be waaaay outside his routine. Risking him having a full blown meltdown in a clinic when I can't physically help him just isn't a risk I'm willing to take given that I have no faith any kindness or even politeness would be forthcoming tomorrow.

Unfortunately DHs company aren't willing to pay thousands of pounds to change airline tickets last minute because I've banged up my foot. He couldn't have gotten here for tomorrow not even with all the will and money in the world anyway.

So I've thrown the ball 77 times for the dog in the garden and let both kids fall asleep in their clothes in my bed because it's the best I've got tonight.

For those counting, so far, my list of people to land with the kids includes the postman, the lady who forgot a poo bag and the woman who I had a three minute conversation with regarding the heat breaking.

@EyeSpyaBlueFoot what an absolutely vile hospital !! You should have been seen straight after the person who took your place in the queue ! Please complain about these vile people !

@minisoksmakehardwork in my vast experience fracture clinic appointments are am only. They are generally run by orthopaedic or senior ED doctors who will e off doing other things after lunch

op. What an impossible situation.

YABU. When I broke my leg, it was hanging off but I still walked 56 miles to my GP surgery because I didn’t want to use A&E in a non emergency situation. I took all 8 of my children, including the triplets who were under 3 weeks old. If I can do it, anyone can.

Sorry, but I am flabbergasted at these comments saying you should have gone to a GP. What in the world can a GP do for you without an x Ray? We have 26000 patients at my surgery and there's not a boot or a sling on the premises. It's not within our remit. What did your GP surgery do in this situation?

Fml. Just as I was posting, I realised it was obviously a wind up. FML

That poster you quoted is joking. 56 miles...

😂😂 good

@EyeSpyaBlueFoot I'm so sorry you are gong through this. It's the pits.critical posters haven't dealt with what you have. I remember recovering from an intense bout of salmonella poisoning whilst pregnant. I had to put my toddler in a high chair I front of CBeebies for a ridiculous length of time while OH went for a job interview (he'd been out of work for 9 months so a lot depended on this) and I literally just laid down and fed him anything he would eat (luckily mainly strawberries) as I couldn't get upright and when I did my arse was about to fall out over the floor. It was horrendous. Son is now totally untraumatised by the experience and I can kind of but not laugh about it now. OH didn't get the job either ffs!

@MrsFezziwig xraying on a ward, all relatives would be moved away from the X-ray tube, children as far away as possible as the effects of radiation are higher in children. In theatre everyone would be wearing lead protection.

The OP's children shouldn't have been irradiated and support should have been offered, as a hcp I have never seen this in practice. Even parents or guardians of children being X-rayed would wear lead protection if not behind the screen.

Oh jeez op that is bad :( I wouldn't have any faith in the receptionist knowing anything tbh. I know you are in pain and out of energy but you are risking an awful lot not going to the clinic tomorrow. Can you get on to pals and kick up a fuss, they will have playworkers somewhere in the hospital and even if the receptionist was an unsympathetic arse there is a clinical need for you to be there tomorrow, with kids of that is your only option.

As for "The treatment for broken foot is rest, strapping and painkillers generally", that is one of the most barking mad things I've ever read on here.