AIBU to question my husband's treatment in a hospital waiting room?

[SadlyNotATroll]

Posting here for traffic sorry. DH had a routine blood test on Thursday and was sent straight to hospital after some concerning numbers relating to his kidneys I think. He was there all day Thursday having tests and sent home. Was called at 10:30 on Thursday evening saying he had to go back in the next morning. I don’t want to over share his personal details on the internet but he is being treated with IV antibiotics but isn’t actually being told what for. Last night they had no beds and he slept in a chair in the clinic waiting room. I say slept but he didn’t sleep at all. Today he’s still there and being told he will be needing to stay in over the weekend but they have no beds. He has no privacy and is sat upright in a chair.

I get that the NHS is in dire straits, I really do. But how can he be treated in a waiting room chair and be expected to sleep and recover there? Do we have any recourse at all? Please don’t think this is a nurse/NHS bashing thread. The staff have been wonderful and it’s not their fault at all.

Yes and no.

Yes: low overhead, accessible care, and protecting patients from catastrophic out-of-pocket costs. Compared to high spending equivalents like the US,m the NHS does delivers coverage at a fraction of the cost

No: sadly our NHS suffers from lower clinical outcomes than its peers, including poorer cancer survival rates and fewer hospital beds and doctors per capita. In terms best clinical survival rates, countries like Norway, Australia and the Netherlands tend to rank higher

Yeah, if only we could kill off the sick and elderly and the 'bed blockers' as a poster put it, wouldn't things be peachy 🙄

Because most "bedblockers" are the elderly frail patients waiting for community care or a carehome. No one should be nursed in a chair unless it's daycare treatment like dialysis.

Quite!

That is horrendous op and yes, I absolutely would complain. The NHS is a shit show and needs complete reform.

Ask to self discharge and whether he can come back for antibiotics and bloods as a day patient since he does not appear to be dangerously unwell. That is what I would do and have done in pretty much the same position. It tends to cause Drs to magically appear if you ask for the self discharge papers

Complain sure but it will not resolve the problem today.

Quite. I don't understand the passivity and acceptance and 'it is what it is' attitude of a failing service we're paying for. I mean, it's not like it's free (OK, free at point of use). If people had the same experience taking their pets to a vet, there'd be blood on the walls of the vet's practice! But somehow we have this floppy passivity when it comes to the NHS - just read the posts here!

I would not sit in a chair overnight. If I’m well enough to do that I’m well enough to go home and come back for any tests deemed necessary would be my argument. I have done exactly this some years ago and was allowed to in the end on the understanding I could measure my own fluid intake and output and attend daily for bloods. Many people taking up beds don’t really need to if we had a proper hospital at home system

My ds was in hospital after an anoxic seizure a few months ago.

After initial assessment (he was admitted by ambulance) he was in the waiting room. There were people there who had been on drips for over 24 hours in the waiting room and still the few 10 hours later after ds was admitted to a ward.

i believe it.

Again the staff were wonderful and they don’t run the NHS so aren't responsible for this but it does happen.

The number of beds in the NHS has fallen by 25,000 since 2010. Maybe it’s time to start increasing again.

I know my local hospital a&e wouldn't let you bring a blow up mattress or camp bed. They class it as lying on the floor which is strictly not allowed.

Really terrible. Seems so inhumane. I think they claim it's to deter homeless people?!

I was so scared of being forced to sit on a horrible chair that when I broke my hip and shoulder I lied on the floor in my house for 24 hours before I let the ambulance take me! Thank God they had me on a trolley but I was so scared they would try and make me sit.

Because they are generally elderly, frail people with no care arrangements lined up, because our social care system is inadequate.

Society and its expectations that treatment can only occur when your arse is in a hospital bed are actually a huge amount of the problem. The answer is not more beds it’s better community treatment

This scares me no end. As another transplant warrior I always worry if I ended up in a&e and no special care.

I always said we would (DH) drive 100 miles to my transplant hospital as I know they would care for me.

Very sad time x

Community treatment needs more staff for procedures like IV antibiotics, it’s much more cost effective to have those patients all in one place.

OP, I am a doctor of thirty years and I believe you. Communication can be appalling in the NHS.

And family cant care for them because the Government wants everyone in a job

What an unpleasant hyperbolic response to a struggling wife. She’s not blaming any individual.

I can't help but think that rhythm and order makes life in the NHS as patients and safer harder than necessary.

I was admitted to maternity in August they kept me in for two days running tests. They decided I needed a CT type scan which can only be done as an inpatient but they only performed the scans on Friday. This was Sunday, I asked if I could go home in the meantime and they said yes. I got a call on Monday to say they would do the scan Tuesday morning first thing could I be on the ward before midnight? Yep no problem, arranged to have some bloods taken there rather than at the GP. In the morning I asked about the scan and they said it would be first thing. Then they said that the scan had been booked to 10.30 and the porter transport at 11.20. slightly confusing but there you go. Porter did arrived at 11.20 and I had the scan after a 20 minute wait. I was back on the ward at 12 15. I was told the results would take half an hour to come back and I could go once a dr had reviewed the scan report and the blood results.

I self discharged at 11.30pm when I still hadn't seen a Dr despite the midwives on duty phoning repeatedly. My consultant had been to see me at 12 but I had hadn't been told this and I hadn't been back from the scan. I knew she was running an OP clinic the next day so I phoned there to make sure I was on her list and I was able to go through my test results with her then and she booked me in for early induction and some follow up tests.

It had the opportunity to be fantastic service I was there overnight so no worries about issues getting there. They knew in advance where I needed to be and when so the porter could have been booked to get me to my appointment and the ward round with the consultant was set for a time when she should have had the results back and I would have had chance to discuss what it meant and sent home freeing the bed for the next person. Instead I spent a day feeling horrible in a hospital bed, in limbo between staying and going. If I had known I would be in all day I would have got comfy and got into bed and brought more snacks and things to keep me occupied. The midwives on the day and night shift wouldn't have spent hours trying to get hold of doctors. The midwife that did the self discharge paperwork was very apologetic and put on my notes that whilst I was self discharging I had been very patient, would seek advice in the OP clinic the following day and if the Dr reviewed my test results and found it was essential I returned i would do.

It took so long because it was only the senior registrar or consultant that could sign off my discharge which is fine but this rule meant I was discharged having not seen any doctor

I think you mean our underfunded understaffed NHS @Boomer55. I promise you none of us want to do this, we all hate the trolleys in corridors and patients waiting for hours in chairs, but we are powerless as we can’t magically produce a bed from thin air. I have been staff (25yrs) and patient, it’s far from ideal, YANBU to say he shouldn’t be treated in a chair@SadlyNotATroll, but it wouldn’t happen if there was a bed or trolley available.

Do you not think the main issue is planning and managing resources?

I contacted the police this morning at 5.30 am as a man was screaming and shouting in my driveway obviously having some sort of psychotic episode. I'm on my own atm and was frightened. My neighbour also called as he was waking up the neighbourhood. This continued until 1.30 pm. The police would not attend. And yet our local pcso, both of them had time to do a litter pick.

It's not just the NHS, it's all public resources so tied up in costly public sector admin and ridiculousness they've lost sight of their purpose.

They did this with a relative of mine in her 90s. Got her out of bed and put her in the waiting room early in the morning. She was there until nearly 5pm, no food not even a drink of water was offered.
It’s happening.

I can’t imagine he needs iv antibiotics though the night, could he have last one at 10pm and come back in for 6am dose?

Do you not think the main issue is planning and managing resources?

Not in the case of hospital beds. You can’t manage and plan what you haven’t got.