To think you don't quite realise how badly the NHS is suffering until you witness it first hand

[DaisyCat33]

My parents are sitting in A&E today. They've just hit 12 hours. My dad was sent there by his GP for severe neck pain this morning. He's had morphine and an MRI scan, but they're now endlessly waiting to see a Dr about results. He hasn't even got a bed to lay on, despite debilitating neck pain. Many people are standing or sitting on the floor.

The couple sitting next to them have been there since 3am, for difficultly breathing.

I'm shocked. Honestly I knew the NHS had it's issues, but this bad?! It's frightening. I also had an email the other day saying my NHS dentist is closing, and it's basically a "well sorry no dentist for you any more, bye bye"

I don't really know the point of this thread really, I just feel shocked and upset that this is how it is. And I think a lot of people don't even realise? My parents definitely didn't until today. They are losing the will to live sat in that hospital.

Does anyone else just feel utterly helpless and anxious about this?

That's really helpful

The NHS is the squeezed middle.

• GP services are minimised / hard to access so people go to A&E or become more unwell and need hospital treatment.
• At the other end of things Social care is so poor that people are not discharged when they need to be.

Add into the mix the cuts to hospital funding, hospital building programmes not happening , poor pay, BREXIT etc Bottom line is Conservatives want to run it down until it’s destroyed

We have to pay more tax if we want the NHS to survive, and we have to VOTE to get the current government out.

@Fluffypuppy1 @Alexandra2001 explained this later- in total GDP we are still high- but if we allocate it per capita (and I just checked ) we are 29th- to be honest that's the level most people would notice- vast amounts within banking system etc to push us to 6th - don't really reflect reality for most

I’m terrified.

im worried my young daughter had luekemia. Long story. She’s had some concerning symptoms that a friend who is a dr told me to get checked out asap.

I rang the drs only to be told they have no appointments….nothing they can offer her. I said could I get a same day appointment, she asked what was wrong and I explained. She said no as she wasn’t sick sick. I said can I ask what medical training you have to be able to triage her like that?

she got so cross she wouldn’t let me speak and I’m in limbo with an unwell daughter and fuck all right now. I think it might be a hospital type thing but it shouldn’t be?

friend of mine has a mass and is meant to be a 2 week pathway and she’s not been giving an appointment in 5 weeks so far…

I am getting desperate. I keep ringing every morning f at 8am and it tells me a 3 mins message and then says ‘we’re full please ring later’ and cuts me off.

it’s horrific.

Are you blaming Labour for the overheated US housing market that caused the worldwide Great Financial Crisis? If you had to chose between Gordon Brown and er...Liz Truss for financial stability I know who I'd rather.
It's not Labour's fault that my school and every other in the country has less teachers and support staff compared to a decade ago. (It's now 2024- Labour have been out of power for 14 years). Schools at present just can't offer the same support to vulnerable children and combined with the fewer staff we now have......it's not a good situation. Just looking at my colleagues, we all look haggard and exhausted. Challenging behaviour is on the up, destroying learning for other children.

Terrible Jeremy Hunt for trying to prevent a mass exodus of talent and professionals sick to the back teeth of paying eye watering taxes that are squandered away on bloody rainbow virtue signalling and ineptitude on a colossal scale serving people who won’t help themselves attached surgically to a nanny state/communism.

CPR is also so physically exhausting to give. You can only do it for 2 mins really before you become ineffective at it

so 18 mins is a long time.

Wow!! 14 years of the Tories and its still Labours fault....... plus Labour never overspent, even after the GFC, debt to GDP was 65%, its now 98%.

Do you have an affiliation to the Tories?

Perhaps you'd like to name the European countries with 8m on waiting lists, 40k nursing vacancies and crumbling schools?

Yes of course I blame Labour! Everyone in the country did at the time, and still do now to sone extent.
Do you not remember that Labour left us penniless? ( literally not a penny left in the kitty) so when we hit a huge financial crisis we were not remotely prepared, and Labour themselves accept this quite readily. Labour have always been associated with fiscal incontinence due to their history of overspending.

Labour have been out of power for 14 years for good reason, as they are largely unelectable and the public can not trust them with the economy.

My 19 year old GS injured his shoulder playing rugby a couple of years ago. I did a "self" referral for him to physio. Physio assessed him and referred him to specialist physio who only deals with shoulders, she travels round several different hospitals doing a day in each.

Shoulder is now fine but it did take several months of physio and me nagging him to do his exercises daily.

Putin would love a Labour government, agreed.

Haven't we got record national debt after 14 years of Conservative government.

I am very scared of being old in this country for that reason. People don't seem to realise that the UK has the worst healthcare system in Europe. What I would say is that people are a lot more ill than they have been, so much that a study in Germany just revealed that the number of people's combined sick days tipped the balance and pushed Germany into recession. The last straw on top of all the other reasons. There are so many studies that say that Covid reinfections weaken the immune system and cause so many other illnesses. Combine that with the government not spending any money on the NHS, and the very poor health messaging in the UK compared to other countries and you have the perfect storm.

PS How anyone can blame Labour after 14 years of Conservative rule, sorry, but that's just silly.

The NHS is on its knees, maybe further down. But yesterday I phoned an ambulance for a choking baby, mother didn't speak English well, at least not while she was panicking. They got a Portuguese translator on the phone who talked to her and the paramedics were there within 10 minutes. They are angels. We are so lucky to have them. I don't understand why governments over the last few years cannot find funding for them.

It’s an awful time for the NHS. I was up A&E with my DS a few months ago as he fell over at school. Had a bad concussion. I took him up at 3pm and didn’t get seen until gone 8pm. He was starving, tired, had a headache and I was at my wits end. Lady next to us had a nose bleed and was covered in blood, nose just kept randomly bleeding. Blood on the floor, the chairs, she was spitting it out everywhere when she spoke to people and it was so hot in there and stunk to high heaven. We were lucky to have a seat.
This last week my dentist went private, no NHS dentist available. I went in to check out their private insurance plan as we all need dental work. Walked in and the place was full of foreign folk currently living in a town centre hotel (the ones that are always in the news). I asked the receptionist what was going on and she said it was the weekly check ups and appointments for the council contract they had. I was absolutely livid. Here’s me and my family having to seek private insurance to cover dental work after being booted from the practice and seeing freeloaders in our place. It disgusts me it really does. On all levels it isn’t fit for purpose.

My MS nurses requested an MRI scan for me last week. Got an appointment for a week on Friday., I work in paediatrics and it's not that bad.

The NHS is on a ventilator in ITU sadly, it is really broken. I think the problem lies in staff shortages but also in undersized hospitals, there simply aren't enough bed spaces to transfer patients from A&E to the wards they need to be on, these poor folks are the ones stuck in casualty with nowhere to go, while others wait in chairs in corridors

@Caffeineislife (hope I've tagged the correct person )your church has done such a good thing .
Our surgery has signs up saying that people can book a session at the local library for training on how to use the online booking system .
But ,I can absolutely see the problems you so clearly outline re older people and phones would still be a stumbling block.

@Toddlerteaplease yes it is that bad. It's unbelievably bad. Folks in other countries don't believe me when I tell them.

Yes so your council tax is going towards this

It's unsustainable

Thanks to the pandemic and the war. Not because of fiscal ineptitude - unlike Labour. I think people have forgotten how bad it was under Labour - after so long on the sidelines. So many are going to be disappointed when the NHS collapses, schools continue to struggle, uncontrolled immigration , recession and debt will again stalk our lives.

You have a very short memory it seems.

Didn't they introduce some scheme where new hospitals were built but were paid for on the never never like an ongoing cost

Exactly. Spent money we don’t have.