Traumatic hospital stay - unusual or not?

[Emphaticmaybe]

Sorry this is a long one.

Just wondering if anyone has found it difficult to get over their child's hospital experience.

6 year old DD's appendix ruptured and peritonitis seemed likely, (temperature spiked and she was not recovering from surgery as well as expected.)

Consultant had made decision not to put a 'long line' in in theatre which meant lots of cannula failures due to amounts of anti-biotics, painkillers and fluids, (I know it's not unusual for cannulas to fail.)

We were told that if the doctors couldn't get an IV in, DD would be at risk of serious complications. Over the next 3 days 6 junior doctors had 16 failed attempts to get a cannula in place and the 4 that succeeded failed within hours. Every viable part of her body was tried and we had to hold her as still as possible while she screamed until hysterical. Her wound was still causing her pain as she still wasn't getting enough pain relief.

At the end of the third day after another cannula failed and the doctors couldn't get one back in and against medical advice, we asked for the anti-biotics to be given orally. The consultant was at home on the phone and he just kept telling his registrar to keep trying to get a cannula in, although it was obvious to us and all the nursing staff that this wasn't working. No further attempts at an IV were made.

It was a slow recovery, including 2 infections of the wound, a granuloma and continuous scans, (8 weeks in total.)

The senior sister on the ward said she had never seen a similar situation in 20 years of nursing and said she would back us if we chose to complain. At our discharge appointment the consultant just said, 'sometimes this happens.'

We did voice our concerns to the Patient's Complaints Service (? not sure if that's right), not because we blamed the junior docs, they were doing their best and visibly upset, but the lack of overall supervision, especially at night, meant DD's treatment was chaotic. As parents we were forced to make clinical decisions ( to give oral anti-biotics rather than nothing) because no-one else seemed to have a clear overview of the situation, ( the consultant gave most of his instructions from home over the phone as most of this happened at night.)

These events happened over 5 years ago, but I kept a diary at the time. I still go cold when I think about it. DH doesn't even like to talk about it. Thankfully DD is not traumatised - she only remembers the day she felt better.

I still don't know if our experience is unusual. Has any one else had a similar experience? Are there any health professionals out there who see this a lot or junior docs left to cope in difficult circumstances? Or was this all just bad luck? DD is very healthy now - I know ultimately lots of people don't get the happy ending we got. Would just like to put this in some sort of perspective - thanks.

No, not unusual, just how the NHS works during the night and in weekends. It can be a lot worse than what your dd experienced - I am not going into detail. I am also sure that there are lots of traumatised parents (and older children).

There is no true 24 hour 7 day a week NHS with properly trained staff. You will only find out how bad it is (or has become) if you are unlucky enough to need help outside office hours.

Patients suffer, but consultants have done very well out of it.

Was told by an out of hours doctor that it was colic when my DS3 was 4 weeks old and i was very worried about him as he wasnt feeding, was moaning, cried when touched. Ignored his advice to contact my health visitor when they opened, took him to A and E and he was admitted with suspected septicaemia/ meningitis and spent 2 weeks in hospital, very poorly and the doctors didn't know if he would make it. Thank god he did.

Then DS3 had pneumonia at 18 months and when I took him to hospital he was xrayed and a junior doctor missed it and discharged him. As a result, when I took him back in again as he just got worse, he had developed fluid on his lung and was operated on for 5 hours to put drains in his lung. I was very angry for a long time as if they hadn't missed it then antibiotics would have treated it rather than my little boy being operated on.

Both these events affected us as a family massively and me very much as i stayed with him in hospital both times. Feel like I am a different person since all this happened and do think about it a lot. It has definitely changed me. I do not trust doctors as much as I did, trust my own instinct far more, I know my child, they don't.

I think it made me quite depressed after both hospital stays,

So to answer your question, yes I have found it difficult to get over my child's hospital experience.

I just have to tell myself that we were the lucky ones as Ds3 is ok now, is nearly 4 now, and came out alive. Others aren't so lucky. But lots of mistakes are made and that's what is hard to forget, especially when he has the scars on his body still.

Thanks for your replies

dikkertjedap -depressingly I feel you are probably right.

turnipvontrapp - your experience sounds incredibly traumatic I can totally understand why you felt angry. I know what you mean about feeling like a different person - I feel much more personally responsible for my children's health, (after this and 4 other hospital stays) - doctors really are only human, (some mistakes pardonable, in your case not I think) and on top of that the system often falls downs, especially at nights and weekends.

Glad DS is well now . Thanks for sharing your story.

Until you see how out of hours care operates in hospitals it's hard to believe how bad it is. My very premature ds was, thank god, born at 11am, with two fantastic consultants in the room (one for him one for me!) I'm pretty convinced that had he arrived during the previous night shift, on the watch of a totally incompetent registrar who tried to convince me to have an emergency c section against all the evidence in my notes, he may not have survived his birth. My blood still runs cold at the thought. I would complain, and I should take my own advice except that I can't bear the idea of more engagement with the hospital than strictly necessary!

I did complain about the out of hours doctor and it was taken very seriously and he was retrained as a result. So hopefully some good came out of it.

Thanks for all replies

I think that the only way it will change is if complaints are made via PALS

I went into the delivery suite on a Saturday evening. My DD was healthy prior to delivery but the lack of care meant she suffered brain damage during labour. It was totally avoidable and we have been told that had it not been a weekend or evening it wouldn't have happened.

Wrong place. Wrong time. My perfect first born, my beautiful girl.

Oh slowly I'm so sorry.