To wonder if as many ambulances are called out over the Christmas period

[Thetelly8]

And a&e attendances I would imagine there are less

I had to call an ambulance on 28th December last year. The ambulance crew told me they'd had a very quiet 3 days, but the day I called it had become really busy again, and we waited for 10 hours in the ambulance outside A&E.

I can imagine in-person A&E attendance numbers might be lower.

Ambulances might be very busy. All the normal health problems they get called out to then the help needed for a seasonal surge in incidents related to alcohol.

We had to go to our local children’s hospital a&e early one boxing day morning a few years back as our DD had fell down the bottom few stairs and had a concussion. It was the emptiest I’ve ever seen it (and with 3DC one of whom is accident prone and another who has had a few illnesses resulting in breathing difficulties we have been there a fair few times!) She stayed in for a few hours for observation, got given a Christmas present and lots of sausages - for months after she kept asking to go ‘back to the place with the sausages’ !

My relative is working in a and e tonight and says they are very quiet. Had 40 patients in the whole department at 10pm compared to a normal day of 120+ at anyone time.
The same during the doctors strike too. It makes you wonder where all these people are. Are there really that many time wasters or are some suffering in silence at home?

My friend works in paeds a&e and typically it's much quieter on Christmas Eve / Day / Boxing Day. If you think how many people are referred to A&E by 111 when it not really needed or because they can't get GP appt it makes sense. Also people are mostly chilling at home rather than playing sports or whatever that might end up with a broken bone.

On the other side, all the people coming in are REALLY ill.

Bloody loads. I did the late shift at my clinic today and the last 5 people were all people with horrible infections who had sat on them for weeks and then decided they had better come in becsuse its christmas. I had to admit all of them. Why do people sit on infections for weeks then come in in a state on christmas eve. I was supposed to come home at 5. I got home at 9pm.

I guess there's got to be a few who meet up with relatives/friends who then say "omg, you need that looked at NOW!!"

It’s definitely calmer tonight but we don’t say the ‘Q’ word!

Everyone comes in ill on Boxing Day.

I’m a nurse and on shift in my hospital and 7 patients in a&e which is unheard of! All pretty much elderly and none of the younger ones you normally get sat in a&e with their mates or family outings! It’s crazy how much attendance changes over Christmas. But new year is a different kettle of fish 😄

I had to call 111 on Xmas Day a couple of years ago - no waiting in a queue and was at the out of hours GP within an hour. Brilliant, except I was half way through dinner prep and too ill/tired to do anything else when I got back, so there was a lot of wasted food.

a few years before that, had to call an ambulance on Boxing Day for an elderly grandparent with cancer and a few other things going on. Equally fast service which I’ve never forgotten.

My DH was admitted to hospital Wednesday night, the hospital was full and he was on a trolly >24hrs. A&E was fairly painless tho, 4 hours in total before being moved to (chaotic) ward

Years ago, I had to take my DC to A&E on Christmas eve. I was told we'd 'picked'the best day in the year to go because it was the quietest.

It’s just proof that most people who attend A+E don’t need to. If you really needed to go, it being Christmas wouldn’t stop you.
If only people used that method all year, the emergency departments wouldn’t be in such a mess.

For some yes. For others no. There will be people who don’t want to spoil Xmas so put up with the chest pain, or the breathlessness, etc. and then die of a heart attack, a PE, etc. there will be women who haven’t felt the baby move but put it off to Boxing Day as they have lunch to cook for everyone today and then find out their baby has died.

It must be quieter. There's no sports being played, building sites etc are closed and fewer road traffic accidents.

Generally quieter but as someone unthread said some people sit on their symptoms who should’ve come in .

Probably more! I’ve worked as a nurse some Christmas days and quite often we were busier.

It was major stuff though cardiac arrests etc

It tends to be heart problems and things brought on by stress and food/alcohol, plus people with chronic conditions who don’t get a break from their illnesses.

Yes the quietest day. People are at home with less risk of accident, fewer cars on the road, no GPs who send a chunk of a&e attendances.

Temporarily Reduces risk of heart attacks & strokes (similar pattern when clocks go back) but unfortunately these will just happen a few days later.

Mental health & alcohol incidents will still be high.

Unfortunately then results in a massive surge a few days into January.

I found when I used to work in frontline healthcare that mornings were quiet but by about 4pm it got busier with families who couldnt stand being together so someone got chest pain and called an ambulance

I had to take my DS to A and E two Christmases ago on Christmas night. He had a really bad ear infection which had suddenly developed. It was really busy, every seat was taken. All sorts was going on including prisoners arriving with police, lots of very unwell people, no one obviously would have been there if they didn’t have to be. It took us about 7 hours to be seen. So, in my experience it wasn’t empty at all!

Sorry you had to work those extra hours, but people may sit on nasty infections for ages because they can't get a GP appointment and know they will have to sit uncomfortably in A and E for many hours to get seen. Then go in when its desperate.

My dad was a hospital doctor (surgeon) and was often on call over Christmas. He did get called in, but not too often. Domestic violence goes up. He had a stabbing one Christmas day and had to go and operate. That was memorable though, so think possibly not super common (thankfully)

Even if you can get a GP appt they often can't really do anything to help.

GPs are just glorified pharmacies really, they can't do any referrals that will come up before 6-8 months, which is usually too long for anything and often they tell people to go to A&E.

You get there and A&E's first priority seems to be to tell people to go home.

It's a mess. And really scary. My mum suddenly lost the use of her leg within a week and was having spasms.

I'm realising that the NHS is just shop front, there's nothing behind it to actually help people. No budget, no availability, no people, no resources. Doctors who can't do anything except move people from one list to another. But hey, the stage set looks great from the outside!! It's scary.