Am I being unreasonable in thinking that we are suffering from a collective Stockholm syndrome re the NHS

[Newbutoldfather]

This is inspired by another thread about a mother with a child in pain being kept hours without painkillers without being triaged, and the responses on that thread. However I have also had an awful experience with my own child over the last year.

it seems amazing to me that in one of the richest countries in the world (we still are), people are content to accept substandard care which would embarrass a country with 10% of our GDP.

In France, MRI’s are standard for muscular injury or complex fractures. They happen within a few days and, often, on the day. ( my reference is Paris btw, not sure about rural France). In addition, you always get a same day GP appointment, regardless of seriousness, no hassle, no waiting for an hour at 8AM.

Finally, although there are some real heroes in the NHS, my own experience (and that of the other poster) are that many lack compassion, which is about culture, not money.

I don’t know the ‘solution’. Any solution is multifaceted and will take time. However, if we don’t admit the scale of the problem and continue to say how marvellous free-at-the-point-of-use is, we will never get acceptable medicine in this country for any but the rich.

I've been in the NHS for almost two decades.

I've worked in a variety of organisations in that time, including an "independent provider" for which read a private company who wins contracts to provide NHS services.

It was nice though busy for a while and it fell off a cliff after 2010. It's really bloody hard graft now, with front line staff getting abuse on every shift and our security staff wearing body cameras.

I'm so unsure about contributions / co-pays at the point of use. People might respect the system more or they might be even more demanding because there is a direct payment for service changing hands.

I do agree some people accept whatever low level of care they recieve because it seems better than the alternative, but lots of people are very critical of the NHS and do frequently moan about it rather than sing its praises.

Personally I find the ethos of the NHS brilliant- free at point of service for all is amazing. It's just not working though. Sure it does amazing things still and lots of the staff are incredible; but wait times, lists, ridiculously high thresholds for referral and treatment, inability to access timely care in many cases amongst other things are just not up to standard. This cannot be fixed by just throwing money at it, although certainly paying staff a reasonable wage, updating their estates as some settings are literally crumbling would help.

This was very close to my thinking when I had raging tonsillitis. White spots and everything, it was even painful to breath😂

www.instagram.com/reel/CpQEMbTjV10/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

When my life will be placed in the hands of a DHL courier I'll ask for some empathy I suppose...

My experiences with the operating staff and the nurses and the doctors on the wards have been very positive.

It is the actual "customer service" as offered by the first-contact A&E nurses and midwives that has left me mentally traumatised and at risk of death on numerous occasions. Getting as far as seeing an actual doctor is like a Light at the end of the tunnel often.

There is no excuse other than a "human factor" to what happened to me in the A&E last summer. It was humiliating and traumatising. After crying and begging for water, pain-relief, a softer seat (I was sitting on a massive, septic abscess) I collapsed from a pain shock in the loo.
I dragged myself on my stomach and elbows to the reception area and refused to leave the spot unless I get seen. I wasn't coherent even anymore. A nurse stepped over me and asked me to "move out of the way". It was 4am, there were 4 people other than myself left waiting and I had been there for nearly 16h without being seen by anyone, not even a triage.
I called for an ambulance from the floor of the A&E reception. I was hyperventilating, agitated and not making much sense.
The 999 operators were shocked and I was after a while put trough to some manager (?). That manager put a call through to the nurses.
And suddenly! "Resources" were not a problem.
I was hooked up to the monitors that all went red beeping mad, was given morphine, a wheelchair, a hot cup of tea, and even a private side-room with a sofa as not to sit on my abscess.
Even on the ward before the surgery I was in a room by myself to allow me to rest after the A&E ordeal of which the word had spread.

The abscess had gone very close to my intestines and I could have died on that plastic chair in the A&E.
I'm traumatised.

It gets my back up when I hear "resources" or "vote" or "government" in relation to A&E. All of the resources I was crying for (and more) were available as soon as The Managers placed a call.
What was standing between the crying me and a glass of water? The nurses.
What happened to me, did not need to happen. I'm bitter. Yes. I wouldn't piss on one them if they were on fire.

I bet it's not the level of "customer service" Americans enjoy.
My mum is in a European country with part-funded model. It really is miles better than this NHS atrocity.

My experiences with the NHS have been over all positive

The people working in the NHS are mostly left wing people.

This is the level of service a majority left wing staffed and organised operation can deliver.

This is how good left wing organisations are .

These are left wing people's standards.

It just wasn’t thought was it. The longest you waited for a GP appointment under Tony Blair was 48 hours. Imagine being able to get a doctors appointment in 48 hours now and then imagine complaining about it

Sorry but isn't this policy the reason why you can't get a doctors appointment now? Sometimes it's not urgent enough to need a same day appointment (dutifully calling at 8am to hold for an hour) or serious enough for a duty doctor call back, but you still need to see a doctor and it would be useful to book an appointment for the 23rd of May and take a day off to accommodate it.

But no. All patients seen within 48 hours. Even if it's totally unnecessary like getting a coil removed or a cyst that hurts a bit and needs looked at and referred to surgery but not RIGHT NOW.

Which means the people who need to be seen right now are lumped in with everyone else calling at 8am to beg the receptionist for an appointment...

Scyla, I hope all those right wing people appreciate all that left wing care in their hours of need!

YANBU.

Most of the problems are caused by the staffing crisis in the NHS which was caused by Brexit and then made worse by the pandemic. Hospitals used to be full of Eastern European staff, now they are not.

It was better under Labour but still quite shit including difficulty accessing a GP. Not helped by loads of them milking their contracts.

I don't think you can have a decent health service through taxation alone. Even labour didn't manage that, it was all beefed by PFI but you can only do that once for each element.

We need to put more money into it but we already pay plenty of tax. When you include council tax - which you should as it's not a bloody utility bill regardless of how it's presented - and Vat we pay loads of tax. What we need is a decent employer copay/insurance system with public elements where needed but properly streamed into actual care provision, wages and training. Like every other sodding universal system in the world. There's a reason why there's nothing like the NHS anywhere apart from the UK and that's because people look at it and think "naaaahhh".

Dc has just done a week's placement on a ward (they are training as a physio). They said the worst thing was some of the nurses, who were often really cruel about the patients and ignored them half the time.

@QueenCamilla I'm so sorry about your experience. Please look after yourself. I developed PTSD after horrendously poor hospital care. Overwhelming pain and genuine threat to life can do that to a person. You do not need to be in a war zone to experience such. Just a regular UK hospital will suffice, sadly. I found trauma focused therapy really useful and would recommend it if you are (understandably!) struggling to process your thoughts and memories.

Sorry folks to rain on the « it was better under Labour » campaign. Been in since 1992. Each successive government has contributed to NHS decline. Because people are getting older and staff are getting worse because managers are now not clinicians and if they are they are bullies.

Most of the current issues are Covid related not funding related. Before Covid the waiting lists weren't excessively long, you could see a GP same day or next day. DM kept being given, for example, cataract op appointments, which she kept cancelling because she was busy. She was offered alternatives within a couple of weeks. I had some orthopeadic work done, op offered within four weeks, I postponed because it was too soon! Etc etc

We're labour in Wales always have been. Our NHS is in a worse state than England. Our GP surgery if you manage to get through on the phone are instructed now to direct you to pharmacist, minor injuries unit where possible. GP mostly phone consults. Only nurses physically present now. On FB they announce every change and on their website. The cringing ever so humble replies as to how wonderful they are are nauseating. The pharmacy next door is on its knees. A pharmacist has to sign off on all prescriptions he is now on the phone talking to patients

THIS WEEKS ADVICE

Following training with the health board last week we are now actively signposting as part of the new Care Navigation initiative which encourages people to use more appropriate health care providers depending on the problem.

These include minor injury departments, pharmacists and opticians, however we are still offering the same number of appointments for those who need a doctor, nurse or health care assistant for their problem. The hope is that this will free up some more appointments at the surgery and offer you, the patient, more freedom to access timely and appropriate advice and treatment.

The reception staff will ask you the nature of the problem and direct you based on your reply.

This initiative is in its infancy but should improve the speed at which you can receive treatment, but this may not be at the doctors surgery as it has historically been.

We will also soon be offering the ability to book appointments online via My Health Online. These appointments will include smears, immunisations, podiatry and phlebotomy.

As ever, we ask that you respect the receptionists whilst they do their job and although you may feel frustrated we will not tolerate any abuse of any kind towards our staff.

,....................

if you have the money my advice is to research private healthcare policies.

I’m in hospital right now, after major surgery, and care has been exemplary. Exactly same last November when my son broke his arm. I may have been very lucky but I’ve only seen calmness and professionalism and have never had to wait about. It’s a huge major teaching hospital in the north of England.

Kicking the tories out demonstrates clearly that we are unhappy with any government which runs our services into the ground.

A warning to future governments that this behaviour is unacceptable and that it’s politically unviable.

Vote them out to demonstrate we won’t be ripped off and exploited like this - regardless of what any subsequent government may or may not do - show that we don’t tolerate being governed like this. The next lot will have to do better.

A comparison. I'm in WA Australia.

Ambulances do come on time. The entire ambulance system is privatised though. If you call an ambulance it will cost you $1000 each time. Unless you have private healthcare insurance which will cover this.

GPs are all private businesses too. If you book a GP appointment, there is a basic Medicare rebate amount the government will provide for you but most GPs charge above that for an appointment because the rebate hasn't kept up with inflation etc. So there's a gap fee you need to pay every time you see a GP. This can be $30-50.

You can search for GPs who will only charge the rebate amount so you are not out of pocket, but they can be hard to find and typically work in big impersonal practices. If you want old fashioned family doctor style care you pay for it.

There is no free contraception as in the UK. I had a mirena replaced here recently. I paid for the mirena itself directly from a pharmacy. Then paid for the appointment to have it placed. Each is subsidised but I was still out of pocket about $120 for the process. This was not an issue for me, but upfront cost of contraception is definitely a barrier for low income women. I work with higher education students (18 year olds) for who the cost of the pill is significant in their budget.

Health insurance is divided into 'hospital' cover and 'extras' cover. Dental is under 'extras', along with things like physio, optometry etc. You can absolutely see a dentist here but again you will pay the full cost upfront or pay a gap fee between what the dentist pays and what your insurance will cover. So despite having insurance that you pay for each month, you still pay an additional cost when you visit.

Having private health insurance is incentivised via tax. If you earn over a certain amount and don't have a valid policy, you pay a hefty extra levy in tax.

Saying that, it is possible to not have any insurance here - I chose to have my babies in the public system rather than the private system and I paid nothing and had generally good experiences. If you don't have insurance you will pay for ambulances, dental etc and have significantly longer waiting times for non-urgent care.

Australia isn't perfect. The UK isn't perfect. Personally I would rather pay higher taxes and everyone access the same level of decent care rather than having it all fragmented by cost and the ability to pay your way out to a higher standard of care.

How people can't see this I don't know. Selective blindness I reckon, tories at heart.

Ambulances do come on time. The entire ambulance system is privatised though. If you call an ambulance it will cost you $1000 each time. Unless you have private healthcare insurance which will cover this

Im in an Australian state where ambulance over is paid by the state government, but I’m pretty sure there are options other than full private health insurance to cover your ambulance care.

Isnt there the option of just ambulance cover, such as St John ambulance cover, which is around 100 dollars for a family, for a year? Over 65s are exempt from ambulance fees as well.

Im not Australian but work in both the private and public systems in Australia and what I like about it is the accessibility to basic tests. I have a GP appt soon (booked around my time off) for some likely perimenopausal issues, but worth getting checked out. I’ll be able to get same day bloods with one of the private labs, scan in a few days with a local private provider, results back quickly. The bloods will prob be “free” in a private lab, the scan could be depending on which provider I go with.

It’s true that non urgent hospital procedures take longer in public versus private, but primary care issues are able to be fully dealt with in primary care, without the need to involve the hospital for “tests”.

Bearing in mind that, if you wanted to, you could insist on a hospital referral for every issue and all tests could be only through the hospital.

Yes over 65s are eligible for free ambulance services in WA. Everyone else pays in some way.

Free in Queensland and Tasmania but not in the other states.

@CaptainWarbeck I recently paid £125 to have a mirena removed because it was causing me problems and there's at least a four week wait to even talk to a GP here now in the UK. I don't know how long it takes to have an in-person appointment because I haven't had one in over two years. They just talk to you on the phone. I even had a hearing clinic appointment by phone. (It was not a success.) Again, I paid for private treatment in the end. We've got the worst of both worlds here now in that if we want timely sensible treatment at all we have to pay full whack, no insurance, no employer schemes etc for the most part. It's a non functioning public system or fully private pay all expenses yourself.

Both times I paid for treatment it was because I was experiencing symptoms that were preventing me from working and hugely impacting on my quality of life. I know other people who have paid for hysterectomies, hip replacements. They paid thousands. To all intents and purposes day to day we don't really have a healthcare system here at all.

That sounds awful @Nivgor. I'm in no way suggesting the NHS is in good shape - it sounds dire from all accounts.

The original ethos of the NHS being free at point of care was admirable. It just isn't working in current practice without adequate funding, pay for staff and decent working conditions.

We've got the worst of both worlds here now in that if we want timely sensible treatment at all we have to pay full whack, no insurance, no employer schemes etc for the most part. It's a non functioning public system or fully private pay all expenses yourself

This is what I perceive as one of the advantages of Australia’s hybrid system, in that the private services are partially government funded.

Private services I’ve used with my children include private dermatologist, psychologist, private labs, private emergency dept, private ENT operation. The operation was paid for by the health fund but with everything else it’s cheaper than UK private costs because of government funding private providers. The bloods were “free”.

bearing in mind that I chose to go private, all of this could’ve been done publicly.

@CaptainWarbeck it's bloody awful really.

Agree with you that the idea is admirable and in fact for the thirty-five year postwar political consensus we had in the UK it did work pretty well. But the country is different now and politics is different too. We can't have something as fundamental to a country's infrastructure as the entirety of its accessible healthcare and all of its emergency healthcare be subject to the whims of whatever party happens to be in power at any given time. It's too precarious.