NHS waiting time

[Mamathebest]

posting for traffic and much needed advice. My 4 year old has had reoccurring tonsillitis since the age of 2. He is regularly on some form of antibiotcs. He also has pretty bad sleep aponea and is exhausted most of the day. DS will wake often through the night struggling to breathe. It’s now got to the point where he is having an infection nearly every month.

DS is barely at nursery and is missing out on so much. I have been fighting the GP for an ENT referral for nearly a year. I just got this done but the nearest appointment isn’t until May 2023!!

DS also has a poor appetite and is quite skinny for his age. He is due to start school September but I’m sure he will be off sick for most of it! Is there anyone that can advice on what I can do? We ended up in A&E recently as the infection got so bad. Was told other then antibiotics they can do nothing to speed up his referral. It’s just so frustrating!

Can you afford to pay for private surgery?

Private all the way.

Poor little boy. Yanbu, it's disgraceful. This is why I have private.

Sorry you're going through this. Any way you could go private? Family help to pay? I know you probably would if you could. Get on the NHS waiting list anyway. Hope things improve xx

Your poor DS. Tonsillitis is awful. My teenager suffered so badly with it, in the end we had to pay to have his tonsils removed privately as the waiting list was so long and he was getting so ill and run down. If you can find the money, it's worth it. Although it's so wrong that you have to pay.

I'm so sorry op. 😂 at the "go private" response. Presumably if that were an option it would already have happened. But you can push. Go back to the gp, HAM it up- his mental health is suffering, his emotional and educational well being, your family life is compromised, etc etc. complain complain complain. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. I HATE that this is true. I wish the nhs was better and worked. I wish it was funded properly and hadn't been outsourced to the nth degree. Dismantled and limping isn't how I want the nhs to be. But I have gone through so much with the nhs, and had to find out the hard way- that it is the worlds complainers, those who feel and demand their entitlement are the ones who get seen soonest. I've done both- the waiting patiently and being grateful, AND the demanding complaining- only one works , sadly.

www.highgatehospital.co.uk/self-pay/private-ent-surgery-tonsillectomy/

It may not be cost prohibitive - but obv depends on your financial position. It's a lot less than I thought it would be actually.

Ring ENT, speak to the consultants' secretary - often several of them will share one - and ask if any of the consultants have a shorter waiting list

I did this when DS needed a glue ear op when small, and it turned out many desperate parents were going private because their DCS had been referred to the one with the longest list
I'll make no comment on why that might have been, but suffice to say the op was carried out very successfully by a different consultant within weeks

Be very wary of going private for surgery with small kids unless you can find somewhere that does that all the time - not a general ENT surgeon making some extra cash. My local hospital won’t anaesthetise under 6 years old, they have to go to the childrens hospital.