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?

I took my son to A&E four days before Christmas with severe abdominal pain, arriving at 7 am. There was no one else in waiting, got seen straight away and by 8pm that night he was having surgery for burst appendix. I know this is not the normal experience for most people and still can’t believe we didn’t have any wait but what we then witnessed on the wards the following few days fills us with dread of every having to go in to hospital again. I don’t know how the nurses cope. How the NHS is run has to change. I fear it’s too late though.

I have serious health problems and have seriously come to the conclusion I'd rather just stay home and die if I have another incident. I couldn't get an ambulance when my bowel was twisted and I was screaming in pain. I have a perforated bowel and sepsis history from the same thing. I've driven myself like this before.
My various visits - waiting hours for pain relief, mistakes with medicine, some staff verging on sociopathic ( I know there are great people too). When mistakes are made I've had staff argue it's you. I've watched people get discharged when they cannot even sit up! I have seen the worst and I am horrified and traumatised by it. If you haven't been in, you don't realise how bad it is
I don't care what anyone says and I know there's no magic fix, but this has become worse under Tory rule. This is what they want.

The global financial crash or one unique to the UK and caused only
by a feckless reckless out of control Labour government?

I'm NOT a TORY voter!
I'm just trying to get people to see how long this has been going on for.
I said I qualified in the late 80s then we had successive Labour governments
All the above issues plus
4 hour targets
PFI
Hospitals were filthy, absolutely hideously dirty compared to now.
The NHS has been shafted for years and the Tories have finished it off.
That's my point

A friend of ours has recently received life saving support and is now doing much better. There were cracks in his care during his prolonged stay in hospital, don’t get me wrong, but overall they were totally amazing.

From the perspective of someone who runs a business I would say that, yes, funding is absolutely part of the issue, but, to objectively analytically observe you can see the areas of mismanagement within the NHS itself too, but I think this is the problem with something that’s a public service.

One things for sure, staff with boots on the ground are doing by their absolute best though in these untenable circumstances.

The NHS isn’t fit for purpose. I’m not sure what exactly the large slice of my pay (or the elderly have contributed all their long working lives!!)actually goes towards other than facilities that actually mean you come out worse than you went in!

The problem is there’s not an alternative, even if you go ‘private’ they can’t do everything and especially not in regional private hospitals. You can even give birth privately unless you ho to London!

Bloody hell - is Cuba really above us at no 13 😮?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita

The NHS was fine 14 years ago.

The NHS hasn't changed.

The government did.

They refused to send an ambulance when my daughter had sepsis.

the worlds gone mad….

@Cerealkiller4U - the two week pathway was abolished in October of last year 😔

You cannot possibly imagine how bad things are in the NHS unless you witness them for yourself. I have a disability and am currently declining rapidly. I have had 3 cat 2 emergencies in the past 3 months. All emergencies have been time critical with risk of permanent life changing consequences or death. The ambulance target is to be with me within 30 minutes. In each case the expected wait for an ambulance was 6 hours +. So in each instance I had to go to hospital by Uber on my own. Ok that’s no biggie if I’m ambulatory and would rather be in a medical facility rather at home alone waiting for an ambulance. It’s when I’ve arrived at A&E that the real horror awaits. I will not depress with the real horror stories but I’ve had to discharge myself and go home because I’d been sat in a waiting room in agony for hours without having seen anyone.

At my main A&E we have to first navigate security then triage to determine whether the condition warrants being in A&E. In my case, triage can be immediate or the wait can be 1 hour + only then do you get permission to get in the queue for the front desk to register. It’s only when you’ve registered at the front desk that the clock starts ticking and you’re deemed at having arrived I.e. the 4 hour wait target. All 3 emergency visits have been horrific but the last one has blown the others out of the water as being really frightening. I was diagnosed by my GP with a suspected stroke and one side of my face had collapsed. This still meant an Uber to hospital as there was no hope of an ambulance. A&E was particularly busy so security was holding back people. It took 15 minutes to get through the door to join the 1st triage queue. I was able to get a seat. It took 45 minutes to go through triage and I was told to join the queue to register at reception. There were 20 people before me. I had to stand. As I was on my own, (I was told not to wait for anyone to get me to hospital by my GP) I had nobody to queue for me. Around half the people in the queue had been processed when a person waiting at the desk collapsed and face-planted the floor. The person was unconscious. The panic alarms rang and the emergency crew came running. The first question asked was whether the person had registered. The answer was no. This meant the patient had to be treated at the desk. This took 20 mins, thankfully the person came round and it turned out that she was a nurse at the hospital. The reception staff were clearly shocked by the events as was everyone in the waiting room. By the time I got to the desk, the time between the first triage and reaching the desk was almost an hour. I then pointed out that it took an hour to be triaged and I’d arrived at the hospital more than 2 hours ago. There was panic stations at reception as a stroke is so time critical. Even so I was still in the waiting room on my own 6 hours later. I did eventually get put in a bay and had my emergency cat scan 12 hours after arriving at hospital (registration time). Thankfully I had not had a stroke but the symptoms warranted further neurological investigation which had to be referred to another hospital. Had the scan showed a stroke, the wait meant I would not be able to get the clot busting drugs. The neurological referral was rejected. The doctor emphasised the need to be seen urgently by a neurologist to rule out a number of acute conditions especially based on my existing complex diagnosis and probed the possibility of me being able to see a private neurologist as I wouldn’t get to see a NHS neurologist in a timely manner. I am lucky. I have private health insurance and my insurer covered this including diagnostic scans. I now have a diagnosis. The private sector does not have the facilities to manage or treat my condition which means reverting back to the NHS. The consultant
Neurologist who saw me privately has bounced me to his NHS queue. I’ve effectively jumped a queue. Talking to the neurologist, he now runs 4 evening clinics a week at a private hospital to meet demand because he cannot in good conscience let patients be left in limbo undiagnosed. He has attempted to extend the neurology assessment clinics within the NHS trust but this has been refused both in terms of funding or providing facilities to see patients. In other words he is unable to get patient consulting space within the NHS for unpaid work.

I’ve watched the NHS decline rapidly over the past decade. The biggest impact has been BREXIT which has impacted both the NHS and private sectors. The way in which recently qualified doctors and nurses have been treated during COVID has resulted in them either reconsidering their career options or moving to other counties to practice. This not just impacts the NHS but the private sector also as it relies on staff (doctors, nurses and physios etc) working shifts when they’re not contracted to the NHS. The situation is frightening. I am looking after myself to the best of my ability to avoid another A&E visit

I agree, the prospect of a Labour government scares me after the Blair/Brown years.
That said, I'm disappointed that the current government have run down our public services into the ground. They have made considerable mistakes, and now haven't enough expertise or time to sort out the mess.
I truly wouldn't know who to vote for as they seem as bad as one another really 😒

Communism 🤣

My DIL had a miscarriage at 4.5 months was left in A & E all day, then said sorry u need to come back on Mon when scanning reopens, found a private clinic, to do scan,was rushed back to A & E and gave birth there.
staff did not care, waited 2 hours to get her gas and air
I hate the NHS

Yeah, I was surprised at how much a private GP,costs when looking this up,(due to no being able to get a GP appointment). It surprise me that the rate was higher than world leading consultants I've seen (when I had private health insurance )

I did want to reply to your post out of politeness, and thank you for reading mine which was dashed off in haste while making our tea. But when I read it through carefully I was sure I couldn’t understand what you were saying so any reply would have been pointless. Just shows how communication can so easily go wrong!

That's awful. I had preeclampsia at 19 weeks (it doesn't usually happen before 20 weeks) and was told to go to a&e. I was waiting around for 12 hours with dangerously high blood pressure and only given one small dose of medication. Luckily the labour ward admitted me after and I miscarried at 20 weeks. It was horrible. It's terrible being sent there when you're ill and having a miscarriage. I hope your DIL is ok now x

Good gracious those who are scared of the Blair/Brown years must have lived through a different experience to me- or have popped onto here from Tufton street - I don't remember eye watering bills or shit in the water, or a whole variety of the current shambles.

I work in a GP surgery and it is difficult. We do try to help everyone but we have to triage calls when they come in and put everyone to the correct people. We have nurses that are able to deal with a lot of the issues that doctors are able to apart from mental health issues, sleeping issues, etc. People who call in for a cough that demand to see a doctor is taking a lot of recourses away from other people who are experiencing something that only doctors are able to handle. Nurses are able to prescribe a lot of the same medication that the doctor would give and are able to refer to physio, dermatology, scans, etc. We get a set amount of available appointments a day and these are used as for emergencies on the day. The NHS is no where near what it used to be and it won't be like that again which is unfortunate, we just don't have the doctors anymore because they know they can get more money and more benefits somewhere else. The doctors I work alongside I praise them because I wouldn't could mentally deal with what they have to in a day, they go above and beyond what they need too because they try to get thru everyone and help. When we close at 7pm there is doctors that will stay there till 10pm doing their case load because there isn't enough hours in the day for them to catch up.

No - shall I say it more slowly.

Labour were reckless and over spent continually during their time in government, and when the financial meltdown happened we were in a dire state.
The cuts had to be done to save the country. We had only just recovered, and the pandemic hit.

I find a Labour terrifying enough but what worries me more are the numbers on here that seem to think they have a magic wand and everything will suddenly be fine - and that is just so far from the truth.

The only thing between us and financial destitution was actually the conservatives! Whether you like them or not. I am genuinely frightened of the country going into serious/terminal decline with Starmer - and no one seems to grasp the gravity of the situation on here. The number of hospital beds is really going to be the least of our worries!

Say it as slowly as you like - I'll leave you to celebrate Liz Truss and the finest the Conservatives have to offer

How will they pay next time?

No PFI to pay later

And you are celebrating a war criminal that took us into a pointless war? So many thousands of innocent people died in Iraq.

I’ll say it louder for the people in the back.
There are no GPs. Those of us that are still working cannot work any harder. The lazy GP rhetoric is complete codswallop. We cannot work 24 hour days, we do not want to make mistakes and we value our mental health. The constant GP denigration is not helping retain us or attract trainees.

Used it last week before the announcement. I knew I had a uti. Tried to call a few local pharmacys because I had read that some could prescribe antibiotics for this. The two nearest ones to me said that they would be soon but not yet. I ended up doing an e consult form to gp. Within 1/2 hour I had a text message to say they had referred me to a pharmacy about 1 mile away and to expect a call. Pharmacist called about 1/2 hour later went through a questionnaire and agreed I needed antibiotics. I collected them about an hour later.