I've known things were bad for a while, but this week I saw the NHS falling around around its ears. Buckle up- this is a long post (I apologise):
After four lots of antibiotics in four weeks for a chest infection that hasn't cleared I phoned my GP on Tuesday morning. I originally had covid and it had gone to my chest. My symptoms were tightness and heaviness of chest, fever of 39.4, a terrible cough and blood-flecked mucus. I also had a very painful left ear Was told there were no appointments to be had (after waiting on hold from when they opened at 8am to 9.15) and I should wait until the out of hours service opened at 5pm.
Phoned them at 5, was on hold for 1hr 45mins and when I got through was told there were no OOH appointments and to phone 111.
Phoned 111 at 6.45pm and got through quite quickly, by around 7pm. Was told I would be phoned back by a doctor based on my symptoms within six hours.
At 1am I received a phone call from 111 saying this wasn't my call back, it was to inform me my callback had been delayed but would be within the next six hours.
At 4.30am I received the call from a doctor. He was very concerned based on my symptoms and the fact four lots of antibiotics haven't worked. He sent a referral to my local A&E and told me to go now. Told me he would say in the referral that I need a chest X-ray, blood tests to check for infection markers, a swab and likely IV antibiotics but that I should tell the doctor this too.
Got to my local hospital at 5am. It's a large, London teaching hospital. Absolute war zone. 43 trolleys with ambulance crews sat with the patients (almost all extremely elderly people) in the corridor leading down to A&E.
I waited four hours to see a doctor, who listened to my chest and took my temperature and looked like I was boring her to death. It was all she could do to touch me, I think if she could have got away with not examining me she would have. Explained everything the 111 doc had said and she snapped and said “yes o can read all of that here”. She said there was a wheeze on my left lung but that I had no fever- and said that like I was a fantasist. Her exact words were “you told the 111 doctor that you had a fever but you don’t”. I explained that I’d taken some codeine about an hour prior for the ear pain which had likely taken it down and she literally scoffed. I then asked her to look in my painful ear and she refused saying “you’ve had a chest infection, not an ear infection!”
She then said that as four lots of antibiotics hadn’t worked there was no point giving me anymore. I asked how that worked as I still very clearly had signs of infection. She shrugged and said “you’ll just become antibiotic resistant” and that I should go home and contact my GP in a week if I was no better. I then said- very politely- that that wasn’t good enough and I wanted the tests the other doctor had recommended. She huffed and puffed, went out to talk to someone else for a while and came back in with a form which she wrote my name on and said “fine, you can have a chest x ray” like she was really doing me a favour.
Chest x-ray done around 10am and I went back to wait for the doctor. By this time I’m tripping balls as I feel so ill and have been up all night. I see the doctor again at 11am who says that I have pneumonia that “looks bacterial” on my left lung but it looks like “it’s clearing up” and that he hospital can’t facilitate further tests or IV antibiotics so I should go home and ring my GP for another course. She also says I should ask for a referral to the long covid clinic. I explain that not being able to see my GP 27hrs ago was what landed me here. I also said that clearly, I don’t have long covid, I have pneumonia. She shrugged and said “well you say you’re tired, that’s probably long covid”(!!!) I asked if she could prescribe the antibiotics. She said she couldn’t as “this is A&E”. I was sent off totally flabbergasted but clear that I was getting no further help from her.
I was with my mum and she drove me to the GP where we went in and explained the situation. Luckily we got the one nice receptionist- or she was just so shocked by the story- who said there were no appointments but if we sat and waited I could see someone after morning surgery finished.
At 1.30pm I eventually got a prescription for 21 months days of further antibiotics from one of the GPs. He said it was a terrible story but he “wasn’t surprised”.
I’ve got no doubt that- probably- if your heart packs in or you’re in a bad accident or something similar the NHS would help. It was brilliant when I had my kids and suffered PPHs. It can probably cope with limited crises and react accordingly. But for someone like me with something that won’t imminently kill them but for whom is ill and could end up quite seriously poorly if left alone, they’re now next to useless. I’ve never felt so helpless. I literally did not know who to turn to after being in A&E. I felt like the safety net that I had believed in all my life was well and truly gone.