@Wndof
I’m not saying for a second your life is not valuable. I don’t think that, I doubt anyone in the clinical or admin team you are dealing think that. I suspect you know that, though.
If you think phoning and contacting them every day will help, then as long as you are polite, do whatever you think you must. I’m not convinced it will move things forward- it sounds like there are complex reasons for delays- but it’s unlikely to cause a delay unless it were to lead to a breakdown of patient-clinician relationships (which I doubt). But please try to be calm and reasonable- not easy I know- but being on the other end of upset and angry patients isn’t easy either.
I think what you are asking for in terms of “outsourcing” is understandable but (kindly) naive as to what is involved in the planning of your procedure from a clinical perspective, the availability of facilities locally and pressures of beds in these other units.
I have no idea if other nearby hospitals (NHS or private) have the specialists able to do the surgery you need and the appropriate post-op facilities. If you need neuro-ICU- from your posts I think this is likely (but I’m not a neurosurgeon, so could be wrong)- then these beds are limited in number. I think they would be extremely reluctant to do the op in your hospital with the express intention of transferring you immediately post-op. There is no guarantee you would be fit for transfer and if that were to be the case but there was no bed, the potential consequences are very serious. I would be very alarmed if anyone would agree to such a plan.
It’s not as simple as just going to another hospital because they (currently) have an available ICU bed. Your team can’t simply check with other units who are able to carry out your procedure and send you up to wherever currently has an ICU bed today. I know it is nice to think that it would be that easy, but it really isn’t. Other specialist nhs units will also have their own patients and waiting lists and bed pressures- I would think that you would need to be higher priority than the most urgent patient on their list for it even to be considered (unless a reciprocal agreement is in place between hospitals/ trusts or in cases of acute emergency). Even were they to agree, you would still be delayed because your surgery will have been carefully gone over by the surgeon and/or interventional radiologist and discussed at MDT. There will be a plan, based on guidelines, best practice and the individual clinicians preferred methods/experiences etc. No doctor will simply read someone else’s plans and just do it that way- it is usually not that straightforward. They’ll need to look at your scans etc and decide how they would proceed. Even if there was an agreement to transfer your care, you would still be at the mercy of the icu/neuro-icu bed capacity of that hospital. There is no guarantee that you’d not run into issues there too.
yes, there will be specialists able to do your procedure that do not work in your hospital. But if they work in another nhs hospital, they are unlikely to be free to come to your hospital at short notice as they will have their own clinical responsibilities at the place they work. And it will be very expensive to get someone privately (especially if they then run into issues with beds again)- not impossible but not common- I’ve only ever seen it happen where there literally was NO specialist working within the trust able to do what was required. And again, these “new”specialists would have familiarise themselves with your case. And you’d still need a free ICU bed.
Look, I get it- you are frightened, frustrated and want to get the surgery done so you can recover and get on with your life. The clinical and admin teams want that for you too. But they have to do it safely, balancing your needs with that if every other urgent case. It’s crap that it has got to this point, it really is. Good luck OP.