Swine Flu and NHS Direct

[NHSDirect]

Hi guys,

We registered earlier today in the hope of being able to answer some of your questions about swine flu, and your comments and complaints about how NHS Direct are dealing with the health alert. It seems that since there are so many SF threads currently open here, another one probably won't go amiss.

I collated a lot of your feedback throughout the day and have passed it on to the appropriate departments within the organisation. I'm sure you appreciaate that these are busy times for us, but all being well, I should be able to give you some responses by Friday, if not tomorrow.

In the meantime, we will continue to provide health advice and information via our website - www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk and to deal with urgent health enquiries (as well as swine flu) on 0845 4647, 24 hours a day.

Take care

NHS Direct

I agree, PrefetParfait.

There is clearly a profile that the NHS Direct staff are using for separating who needs self-help advice, who needs to be referred to a GP and who needs emergency care ASAP. Would it really be that hard to have a summary sheet of A4 available for the general populace to tell us what that protocol is?

Then we could just get on with it rather than wasting time on hold/waiting for a callback, unless it was rather more ambiguous.

Erm I mean protocol, not profile. . Damn the post-viral brain fug

Well as they are that busy why the heck are they wasting their time posting the same old poop on here that you can get on the website ?

Waste of time.

Thing is rubber duck. In theory we have had that. In theory we all had the "swine flu" leaflet a month or more ago.

In practice some houses appear not to have received one (by reading MN); others will have thrown it straight in teh bin; others will have read it an forgotten it; some may have kept it, but lost it. TBH I don't think the leaflet, contains the information which would be helpful for suffers. It was written to trry and avoid panic IYSWIM.

At the time it was fine. It was not really present in teh community, so it was just a news headline for most people. now that it is in the community, we all need that message again. We need more information available to us now, and we need it broadly accessible and imprinting on the brain so that we can deal with swine flu when it develops rapidly, without having to look it up.

Agree totally Prefet, I was trying to say this earlier but am still not quite with it, you've put what I meant to say.

We got the leaflet, it was totally useless and the same information that is regurgitated over and over again.

I would like to know the exact protocol.

Is it temp over X, contact GP immediately? Shortness of breath that puts you on the "you really shouldn't be relying on self-care". WHAT exactly. I mean, how hard would it be?!

It appears to me that the flu itself isn't the crisis, the media hype is the crisis, they have worked people into a frenzy and if someone at their childs school gets it they think their child will get it and die.

I suppose it doesn't help that survivors was on bbc tv recently and that sticks in peoples minds.

This government is good at soundbites but useless in a crisis.

It would help if the swine flu symptom checker on the website wasn't always down.

I have what I assume is swine flu but can't phone NHS Direct (no phone) and don't feel the need to bother the GP when I am managing it fine at home. So how am I supposed to find out?

EXACTLY.

That is the info we need now.

HOW to treat/not treat.

It needs to be clear.

It should not introduce conflicting messages (sadly I think GPs are getting numerous changing protocols within a day, so what hope have we got).

If the general public had that informtaion we would not need to ring for that advice. The majority of the population would self treat, leaving hte telephone lines for people that do need further assistance.

TBH I think it is bloody obvious. Not sure what the Government are thinking about ATM

ahhh NHS Direct huh.. right

DD has swine flu.. she's taking Tamiflu..

But when we were trying to get some type of answer as to whether it may or may not be swine flu.. this is what we got when we rang NHS direct:

"IF it's about a young child press 2"

so you press 2

and then get

" this service is no longer available"

so that will be helpful then won't it..

Ie if you think your young child may have swine flu, bug off!

luckily we didn't get the same reception from our GP surgery who put us straight through to the GP and who did everything via a telephone conversation.

This was on Tuesday this week guys and we were calling when DD had a temp of nearly 40!

Also regarding the leaflets... urm we still haven't got ours.. so that was helpful too!

Watch out NHSDirect, mumsnet is addictive!

Can you run through the symptoms please? Alot of people on here have had symptoms that clear up in a matter of hours and are mild in comparison with others who have really been suffering. Are the milder symptoms (sweats, cough, snotty nose, aches) also Swine flu or something else? It's hardly worth bothering the GP if these milder symptoms only last a few hours. Are people who have had milder symptoms immune? Should they be checked for swine flu incase they have had something else and think they are immune?

Many, many thanks.
Fluff.

yes symptons would be good

dd had a temp of 40.9 that went down to 38.3 with paracetemol. Shes snotty but not able to tell me much at two. I do'nt want to bother my gp though as getting past the receptionists on the phone is a nightmare

Not seen that Fluffy Bunny.

Lat night I was cinvinced that I had SF (aching neck, shoulders, elbows - all developing v quickly. Rapidly rising fever). Very swollen glands whcih inflated v quickly.

This morning my neck still aches a bit. But nothing else. So I have assumed it is nothing. Could it have been? Do I need to qurantine myself?

I've no idea Prefet.
Ds had a 'flu' like thing on Sunday night (odd fever that came and went in 30 mins, sneezing, snotty), I had the same on Tuesday but with nausea, achy limbs, sore throat for all of 10 minutes, felt a little warm. I don't know if it's something going round at the moment or not.

Well now it's 29 dead (not counting the ones like the GP they claim isn't SF related) and 55,000 cases diagnosed last week ! That's without the ones they are fobbing off because they don't meet all their criteria !

But they claim the new line to get Tamiflu will be up and running next week (hmmmm ) should have been up and running weeks ago !

The number in hospital has doubled 652 and in intensive care it's just under 60.

So if we prehaps double all those figures?? then we may have a clearer idea of whats going on.

Our wonderful government have done it again, they have put us in the worlds top three, just not for anything to be proud of.
Useless.

I wondered how Britain managed to get to be first in line for the vaccine?? Considering Brown is useless and then I saw the WHO report on the new vaccine;

www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/notes/h1n1_vaccine_20090713/en/index.html

and realised that with them not being sure how safe it is, of course Brown has offered us up as lambs to the slaughter.

Typical.

IMHO Dont bother with NHS direct, cally our gp straight away. They will call you back on the phone and give you advice much better than those non medically trained, sat in front of a pc, people will ever do.

spoke to gp yesterday and had a script waiting straight away.

What I want to know is it the swine flu or the tamiflu side effects making me feel so bloody bad? and how long should i realistically expect to feel like this?
this is not normal flu, i am ok enough to be out of bed, although the stairs feel like climbing a chocolate mountain. i am so hot.

i am also a single mum, with no bloody outside help. as soon as gp said about tamiflu, my instinct kicked in and first thing i doid was go supermarket to execute my ombie plan....and i was spotted and grassed up to the school. DD2 was sent home, although she is well and not showing any symptoms.

I just want to get better. How much longer is this going to last?

dd is still lousy
don't want it confirmed as swine flu as this is the one weekend we have a car big enough to fit us all in so days out. Really bad of me I know

I have never had any cause for complaint of Nhs Direct before, they have always given me good advice, if I have had to ring.

But I honestly don't think they can cope with this outbreak, and the numbers of people.

Secondly and more importantly, I went through the swine Flu checker for my Ds last Friday, and it said that he hadn't got Swine Flu, I wasn't happy with the result so rang my Gp who confirmed Swine Flu after hearing his symptoms.

I just hope people are using their common sense, and if using the checker which gives a negative result, and they are pretty sure it is Swine Flu , they ring their Gp for confirmation or just self-medicate at home.

People who just use the NHS Direct checker and it says No Swine Flu, may have it and are then infecting others.

Hi Mumsnet,

As I mentioned yesterday, I cannot answer your specific medical questions. I'm sure you understand that for reasons of patient confidentiality and to avoid clinical risk, we cannot post clinical information on public forums or chat-rooms. The same applies to Twitter.

Nevertheless, in response to a number of you asking where to find a comprehensive list of symptoms, www.nhs.uk has information here:

www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Pandemic-flu/Pages/Symptoms.aspx

Here is the link again to www.nhs.uk Swine Flu Q&A where you can find the answers to many of your questions regarding pregnancy, young children and vaccinations.

www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Pandemic-flu/Pages/QA.aspx

Many of you have asked for general advice when caring for babies and toddlers with flu-like symptoms.

I have sought advice from our Clinical Team, and they have advised that the symptoms of children under five can be difficult to assess, since younger children react differently to illness. This is why use of the online health checker if not advised when enquiring for children of this age.

People who need health advice and information for children under five are encouraged to phone their GP.

Hope this helps. By all means, keep your comments and questions coming - I'll do my best to answer them.

Take care

NHS Direct

But you haven't answered them all you have done is point people back to nhs direct pages, some of which are wrong and out of date.

Your symptoms page is very wrong unless there are two epidemics sweeping this country at the same time your symptoms do not match what people are experiencing.