I witnessed how fucked up the NHS is

[Bloom15]

Last night I had an asthma attack and got a taxi to the nearest A and E. it was like a scene from a zombie movie!

I was rushed through triage and given 2 nebulisers and some oxygen, along with some steroids. After I was stable I was told to wait in the waiting area. It was mostly full of people on drugs, drunks and people asleep on the row of chairs surrounded by multiple carrier bags. I am not trying to disparage these people as they were also patients and needed to be seen. Just describing the waiting room at 11pm on a Bank Holiday Monday in a city centre a and e department.

After 6 hours I still hadn't been seen by a doctor but had to leave as my DS was staying over at my parents and they were dropping him off at 8 am as they were going on holiday. My DH was stuck in Newcastle following a stag break and couldn't get home at 4am. Usually I could have stayed.

Now I am at home with a tight chest (DH rushed home early but a taxi from Newcastle to Liverpool at 5am was too much money). I tried to call my GP for an appointment to get more steroids but after 45 minutes of ringing from 8 there were no appointments left.

This is not the fault of the doctors, nurses, other staff, any patients. This is the fault of this government dragging the NHS to the brink. Please vote them out in May

My brothers live in a small town in Spain. The health care there is exceptional and free.......

You can say this but it evidently is not true I'm afraid. Changing the ruling party DOES make a difference.

It is interesting that waiting times start their upward trajectory under the previous Labour government after levelling off as the UK entered the deepest recession in 70 years.

It literally doesn't. The NHS has always been a bloated, mismanaged, bureaucratic, soul-destroying hellhole of an organisation. It's the largest employer in the country, yet 150,000 people died last year waiting for treatment.

Labour doesn't have a plan to do anything meaningful once they get into government. The NHS being in the state that it's in has nothing to do with party politics and all to do with the business model. There's a reason why no other western country has adopted it.

Did you look at the graph?

Well, I’d be dead without it, since I have severe Crohn’s that I was diagnosed with when I was a very poor and alone 21-year-old and the medication I need costs £10k per eight weeks. People in the USA do die young, or become permanently housebound and disabled and depressed, with what I have. Thanks to the NHS I’m a fully functioning member of society able to live a mostly normal life. Why not try to fix it, instead of giving up and condemning people like me to an early grave or a life not worth living.

There are alternatives to the NHS or the American system…

Always the debate of how the Govt have broken the system, never the users of it. Vote Labour / Liberal Dem / Monster eaving looney party and it'll get fixed.
No party ever says what it will do, apart from fund it more, rather than a system that (works and) means that some of those people that don't need to be there aren't there.
Asthma attacks, heart attack scares, broken bones, children suddenly ill, all worthy, but justled in amongst those that don't.

No party ever says what it will do, apart from fund it more, rather than a system that (works and) means that some of those people that don't need to be there aren't there.

@Exdonkeylover It sounds harsh, but I do think that some fees need to be introduced for people who do daft things like drink and get into fights. It doesn’t need to be a ridiculously high amount, just enough to make them think twice about doing it again.

Very much agree! Just a simple charge to make people think, can it wait until tomorrow

I think there should be charges, after all , people pay for dentists ( when they can get to see one)
I feel it could help with the time wasters if nothing else. I know people say it can't done , but surely something needs to change around health care and the NHs in general
It's not fit for purpose as it stands at the moment and radical changes are needed
Which I know is easy for me to write ..

That’s terrible, so sorry for your poor uncle and aunt and your family.

We’ve been twice recently and luckily seen straight away, both times was life threatening (me with thyroid storm, ds with appendicitis). Both times we got ourselves to A&E. It’s terrible but don’t believe there is any point calling an ambulance these days at all as you’ll die waiting.

Non-emergency terrible too, my ds has a genetic condition. Just been diagnosed as we went private for diagnosis/surgery, was urgent now but would still need to wait 18m for NHS surgery by which time it would be too late and would need much more intrusive surgery. Been missed in the NHS for 6 years despite it being on the radar and dragging round various hospitals from 2018 onwards (central London teaching hospitals). So many times it was mentioned in correspondence, as in ‘we don’t believe he has ‘xyz’ known to cause these symptoms’. No explanation why, were treated like we were making a fuss about nothing. Going so long without diagnosis has caused life long irreversible symptoms. He’s 11.

Too many people, not enough money paid in tax, no services for mental health.

Too much of the money paid in tax given to wealthy mates in dodgy deals

You really have your experience it to believe it... I know people say what a mess the NHS is in but get them to an A and E on a busy night and their jaws would hit the floor...

I hope you're feeling better, OP!
I agree that the NHS is screwed, but I live in Wales - Labour have been running the whole country, NHS included, into the ground for years! We now have the longest waiting lists out of the whole of the UK. Education has also gone down the pan. My husband has been waiting 2.5 years for an operation that his cousin had after 14 months in England; we had to max out a credit card to pay privately for an urgent referral (and surgery) for me last year, after I was told the wait would be around six months on the NHS - for posdible cancer! The Conservatives may be doing a crap job in England, but Labour's track record in Wales is also fucking appalling.

Woah. Sorry you have Crohns, that’s rubbish. But you wouldn’t be dead if you lived in another country! I’m not for one minute suggesting that people who can’t afford medical treatment are condemned to death.
Its not black and white. You don’t have to have either everything free for everybody, or everyone paying for everything. In fact, if the system were changed so that people who could afford it did pay something toward their treatment, then more lives would be saved in the UK. Too many lives are lost due to lack of funding, as the NHS funds treatment for absolutely everybody, regardless of their financial situation.

People who are refusing to recognise the damage 13 years of Tory rule have done to this country are beyond me. Yes it will take a long time to put things right but why would anyone trust the shower whose policies have caused the problem in the first place? I will be voting LibDem but only because there isn't a hope in hell of Labour winning in my constituency. The Tories will try every trick to get your vote, please don’t be fooled, they are a party of shameless liars and cheats and have been shown to be over and over again.

111 will give you the steroids

The OP said the waiting area was full of non urgent cases. In Accident and Emergency. Abuse of the system is rife. It’s carnage because some people shouldn’t be there. No GP services doesn’t help. No government can win with the NHS. It’s a bloated behemoth.

@Pliudev I agree that it’s time for a change (well overdue) but I suspect that to effectively overhaul the NHS, the next government will need to make some unpopular decisions and ppl will have to start paying for certain services, similar to dental work. It’ll be rough.

What I don't get is you can access so many sites to find out how to do basic first aid or visit a pharmacy for most minor problems or illnesses, so why anyone would choose to sit on a hard plastic chair if they really didn't need to !
Just why ?
The security should just throw out the trouble makers too. Again , I know it's easy for me to say and I've never worked for the NHS, but it's sad the people working there have so much to deal with and I've certainly not got the answers.

Asthma attack is cat 1 - similar to heart attack.
It is potentially fatal if not treated quickly.

But do you trust the people who run this country to implement something that actually works? Because nothing else they have implemented does. As soon as you start privatising bits of it, you expose anyone who relies on it to the political whims of whoever gets elected - even more than is the case right now.

I hope you're feeling a bit better and can get an appointment for follow up with your GP.

I'm an NHS nurse so I know just how dire the NHS is right now. I've never known things as bad as they are now...services cut back to beyond what is safe or sensible, staff stretched far too thinly and utterly burnt out.

We need to GTTO.