Full story of Tink's asthma attack

[TinkerBellesMum]

On Friday Tink started with the runs. I was at antenatal, she went through the last nappy I had with me, so I called her dad to come out and bring me some. In the meantime I left her with just a T-shirt on, she's fairly potty trained anyway so I wasn't worried about leaving her without a nappy. She then passed wind and covered the waiting room in watery-pooh The MW's were great and said I needed to get her to my GP.

Get there and she covers their waiting room in vomit! GP checks her over and when she's feeling her tummy is a little concerned about the breath rate so counts them. She's over 60, she is tugging (got dips at the little v on her throat and the base of her breastbone) and her temperature is 38.6. She says she's not too worried about the D&V as there is a bug going round, but she's not happy with the breathing. She gave her ten puffs of blue to try and slow it down and sends us into the waiting room while she sees the next patient. She called us back and she's no better, in fact she's gone from playing on the slide before we went in first time to lying in my arms. She rings ahead to The Children's A&E and gives me a letter for the paediatrtion.

(Here comes the bit I'm not happy about)

Mum picked me up from the GP, she gave the letter to the receptionist (who didn't open it), she took Tink's name and address and told us to sit down (didn't ask what was wrong). Mum told her that Tink wasn't well, the GP had called ahead because she was breathing too fast and she had failed to slow it down and that we needed to be seen urgently. Receptionist said "no he hasn't". A nurse then spoke to us, read the letter and said we'd be called into Triage soon. Triage saw us, her O2 level was down, her heartrate was up and her Temp was now 39.4. Tink wouldn't allow them to give her Calpol, if she opened her mouth it was to stick her tongue out! Nurse said we were priority and would be called through quickly. We were left for 1 hour and 20 minutes in the waiting room, her tempature and heart rate were rising and O2 dropping, she became more and more lifeless. We kept asking how long it would be because we could see her disappearing before our eyes.

She was put onto a monitor which she kept setting off as they couldn't get enough oxygen into her and her heartrate was swinging between 130 and 215. She was nebulised almost constantly for three hours when her O2 levels stayed above 94. They took her to observation as she was too ill to go to a ward. Mum took me home and TBD stayed with her. They continued to nebulise her and around 3:30 she was taken to another hospital.

The plan had been to nebulise her every two hours moving to four hours by last night and giving her inhalers over night so that she could come home tonight. By last night she was still on 2 hourly and it was reduced to hourly. They finally got it to 4 hourly this afternoon and she's now on inhalers over night with a plan to come home tomorrow night if she is responding.

I'm planning on going into the first hospital to speak to PALS as I'm not happy about being made to wait so long with an obviously sick toddler who had been sent by the GP and had gotten worse between leaving the surgery and being triaged.

It's sounds awful for all you poor Mums who have had your lo's hospitalised so often - it must be hideously worrying, and puts ds's problms into perspective!

Thanks for the tips about using a syringe to get the soluble steroids into him - I'll try that next time

Grrr sounds like they're really trying to cover themselves!

Just had PALS on the phone. Apparently she wasn't that ill, it was the meds that sent her heart rate up to 200 ("and 15" says me) her Sat's weren't that bad, we weren't there for 80 minutes (lets all do the maths, 16:20 arrival, 17:40 in cubicle) and she had paracetamol (which helps an asthma attack how? and the fact she refused it?)

She asked if I would like to speak to the A&E manager, I said if it's the person who sent that email then no. She will get the wrong side of my tongue and that's not going to get us anywhere.

I told the PALS lady that I may not be A&E trained but I am trained on the ambulances and can read an oximeter so I know what I've been told was a load of rubbish. I also pointed out that I do not know anyone (thanks to the people who answered my survey) who has sat in a waiting room with an asthma attack.

So the next step is the Chief Exec of BCH.

I've called my GP surgery, receptionist suggests I call back Monday to speak to the on call GP (we have phone appointments in the morning). She remembers Tink and she said she was very ill, if the receptionist at a GP can say that what does it say for A&E?

That really is shocking!

DS2 has a supressed immune system and he was always in hospital with asthma/ bronchial problems up untill a year ago,(he will be 5 on Sunday).

We never had to wait as soon as they saw his O2 levels were below 92. They were usually aroung late 70's early 80's. Neither should a child be allowed home untill they are 24 hours free of needing O2.

We now know, however that his SATS regularly sit around 88 - 90 when he is asleep and well, and after sleep study after sleep study that at this stage it does not appear to be affecting his heart.

I HATE asthma/ breating problems! They have cause all of my grey hairs!

sounds like you have been given a complete run around TM. A+E have been crap and am sorry you and tink had to go through that and there is nothing worse when your little one is ill even if it is something you have often experienced.

I'm really glad I posted this because it's helped me see it's not just me being "Mum" or "PFB" or whatever. Sometimes it's hard to know what is really in your "professional" opinion when it comes to your own child. I spoke to my trainer last night, he's on my FB friends list, he still works on the voluntary ambulances that I was trained on but runs 999 calls (since we did such a good job backing up the ambulance service at the Millenium, the none life threatening 999 calls are often answered by a group of us who are paid to run them). I gave him her stats and asked what he would think if that was a toddler presented to him, he said "that she needed help ASAP". So at least I know I remembered my training well. He wasn't impressed with the way I was treated. He asked if it was a general A&E (that's notorious around here) as he didn't think it could be BCH.

Spoke to Mum this morning, she said for breakfast Tink had 6 (SIX) yoghurt's (the small ones though) and for lunch she's had a large tin of rice pudding to herself! She's still not eating properly so Mum is just giving her what she thinks she will eat.

I will keep you all updated with what happens with Tink and the complaint.

Spoke to the GP this morning and she's going to do a print off from the two appointments before we went to A&E (Thursday and Friday). She said she didn't know how helpful it would be as it says she seemed well, but I think it will be very helpful because it shows she was going downhill rapidly.