Gynaecology waiting lists double, leaving women in pain

[IwantToRetire]

Waiting lists for gynaecology appointments across the UK have more than doubled since February 2020, BBC research reveals.

Records show around three-quarters of a million (755,046) women's health appointments are waiting to happen - up from 360,400 just before the pandemic.

This would suggest around 630,000 people - at the very least - are on the list to be seen for problems that range from fibroids and endometriosis to incontinence and menopause care.

Health ministers across the UK say they are working on plans to improve the situation, but health leaders say that women are being let down.

Article continues at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyvg2157mvo

I was going to ask how this compares with other areas of health but saw this later in the article:

"Gynaecology is the only elective speciality that solely treats women and has one of the worst waiting lists across the UK.

"This reflects the persistent lack of priority given to women and women’s health, " Dr Thakar says.

"Women are suffering. We know it is affecting their mental health. They are not able to go to work, they are not able to socialize."

Dr Thakar adds that if the women had been treated earlier, their conditions wouldn't have progressed as much, and they would continue to contribute to society

but this is not supported by scientific evidence.

🤦‍♀️

Gynae care has been woeful for years.

When I was 45 It took a year of monthly trips to A&E to be diagnosed correctly and a complaint to the hospital about my consultant dismissive behaviour to finally be referred to someone else and get the partial hysterectomy I so badly needed.

I lived with constant pain and could not leave the house in the end because I was bleeding so much.

I had endometriosis, adenomyosis and a benign but large tumour at the top of my womb.

Ironically, after surgery I developed complications and was transferred to the Women’s where I stayed for two weeks. The care I received was outstanding; it was infinitely better than I’d had from the private hospital. It’s just a shame that the waits are so long.

It's because UK is the world hospital and it's unsustainable

I remember someone in the tories (last gov) was trying really hard to create all in one hubs for women, for anything gyne related, contraception, smears, scans, hrt, everything. But also linked to that a more holistic approach also including wider health issues affecting and over lapping with gyne things.

It's appalling that nothing has improved despite the gov clearly knowing there needs to be.

I'm on an anti breast cancer drug that can affect the lining of the womb, worst case scenario being causing cancer. I had a bleed change recently, but it could be still changing / getting used to the drug. Asked if the specific symptom was common in a group for people on the drug and was advised to go asap as waiting times for scans were so long. Some had been waiting months and months with real concerns about their bleeding. Anxiety was through the roof - harder to manage when you've already had a cancer diagnosis previously.

This is a huge concern for gynaecological cancers that aren't picked up via routine smears. I fear some will be missed due to waiting times. As many are picked up when checking for other things such as fibroids.

I was referred to my local endo specialist centre
One consultant is off sick, one on mat leave which leaves..one

My referral process started a year ago with ovary pain and I'm still waiting. Next month is the MDT meeting and then it's waiting for surgery
The doctor has finally given me morphine after I've had to ring 999 twice in 3 weeks

Oh and they did originally send me to Spire who took one look and said they are sending me back to the specialist centre NHS as it needs a colorectal surgeon

I remember someone in the tories (last gov) was trying really hard to create all in one hubs for women, for anything gyne related, contraception, smears, scans, hrt, everything. But also linked to that a more holistic approach also including wider health issues affecting and over lapping with gyne things.

If the NHS don’t know what a woman is how can they create hubs for them?

@JurassicPark4Eva has a genuine point here. Many statistics are thrown at us without any background. One that springs to mind is the poorer outcome for women of 'BAME' origin in maternity care. This is attributed to racism without any investigation of other possibilities. I am not saying racism is not involved, but cultural factors, language, FGM etc. are also likely to be contributory factors in poorer outcomes and also need investigating. The same with long waits to see a gynaecologist - other factors (though women's health always seems to be a low priority).

Used a throwaway YouTube for this but this is my standard pain
In this video I've taken the maximum dose of paracetamol, naproxen, dihydrocodeine and Buscopan
I've been like this since January and it's affecting my levels of sickness at work who are understanding but also bemused that I'm in so much pain with no appointment any time soon

It's no wonder women just want a hysterectomy because living like this is hell, with no idea when the pain will flare
I videoed it because I sent it to PALS to say this is ridiculous I need help
If a broken ankle is a 4/10, this is a solid 9/10

https://youtube.com/shorts/S7VCuBf5eP4?si=_KTQlCvBgihXgbcD

I think a lot of poorer outcomes for ‘BAME ‘ can be linked to poverty and much of that can be linked to their recent (as in first generation) immigration. I do not rule out a role for racism - I am sure it has an impact too.

"Gynaecology is the only elective speciality that solely treats women and has one of the worst waiting lists across the UK.“

This paragraph jumped out at me. Are medical students not choosing to specialize in this area, therefore there’s simply not enough gynecologists available? It’s not clear from the article.

I saw the BBC report and it was heartbreaking. Lives ruined. This shitshow NHS which denies small ops thus creating much greater health and social problems at vast expense doesn't even make sense at the most basic financial level.

It's not just gynae. My young adult neice was expected to pack in her uni course and social life to live on her sofa taking tramadol to cope with gallbladder pain. The list is months and months long. Even private can't do it quickly because of all the poor blighters who's families have raised the necessary funds are causing backlogs in the system.

'luckily' she had an episode so bad my sister took her to A&E (again) and raised absolute hell. She had the op and the surgeon told her off for not coming earlier AAAAAAARGH do any of these departments speak to each other, at all?

The whole thing needs rebuilding from the ground up.

do any of these departments speak to each other, at all?

That was the gist of the complaint I mentioned above. In passing I mentioned another couple of departments and the manager, who admitted there was a problem with the departments my complaint related to, responded with ‘arghhh, don’t mention them - they are even worse!’ His excuse was they are all too busy firefighting.

And will these hubs have an anesthetist

And its not new either. My first gallstone attack was on 3 July 2002 Operation on 28 April 2003 Lost my job in the meantime as well as back and forth to A&E Told to mix my painkillers to kill the pain so Tramadol paracetamol ibuprofen until finally given morphine pills which melted under the tongue

Some parts of the NHS work well. The rest of it needs to learn from those that do. I recently had an NHS procedure with minimal delay and maximum efficiency. It can be done.

There might be a lack of specialists in some areas and you can't solve that overnight. But you can solve the fobbing off issue.

Gynaecology is not fit for fucking purpose, it makes me so, so angry!!!

My poor daughter suffered for 10 years before being taken seriously about potential endometriosis, I recognised it because I’ve had it, but they said she was far too young at the age of 14, she started her periods at 10. In the end we had to pay for a laparoscopy, she was riddled with it , and had a uterine anomaly called unicornuate uterus, the part of the uterus that hadn’t formed was a rudimentary horn that constantly bled and caused pain, not just at period time.

Fast forward to the age of 27 and having to change gynaecologists due to his hell bent opinion that preserving fertility was paramount, the fact she had no fucking life was irrelevant, she couldn’t look after her dogs, could no longer work and her mental health was shot. The fact was that the condition rendered it nigh on impossible to have a viable pregnancy.

Thankfully the new private gynaecologist could see the bigger picture and agreed to a hysterectomy, my daughter burst into tears with relief, he also did the most amazing thing for us, we had no medical insurance and were prepared to pay 9k for the procedure, he put her on his list at the NHS hospital that he was based at.

After all the trauma of not being believed, being chased by school for being off every month because of her periods rendering her bedridden, and a manager at work saying “ for fucks sake” every month that she couldn’t get out of bed. We are now dealing with a new diagnosis of Complex PTSD, due to the constant battle for years. Her formative years have been stolen due to incompetence and ignorance, and nothing is changing, in fact it’s getting worse and my heart goes out to these women. My daughter was fortunate that we were able to pay for some of her treatments, not everyone is in this position.

I remember being in labour and my midwife was also looking after a patient in the next room. The poor woman was obviously in agony, and making a lot of noise. The midwife was attending to me and I suggested that she go and sort the other lady out first because her need was greater than mine. She rolled her eyes and said “She’s fine. She’s African, they all make too much fuss”. This was 25 years ago, and I was utterly horrified. Now whenever I hear of poor outcomes for BAME women I wonder whether those attitudes are still prevalent in healthcare and how much of a factor racism is.

My sister in law decided to go herbal for the menopause, she now has osteoporosis at the age of 59 🥺. I’m HRT all the way, don’t drink or smoke and my life is so much better for it!

@Snippit that’s horrific, your poor DD.

I was somewhat the other way, told directly by my GP that endo would be worth investigating if it was for fertility, but because I’d told her I didn’t plan on having children then knowing whether I had it or not ‘wasn’t warranted’. I already have my own hang ups about being a childless woman and to be told I as my own person isn’t enough of a reason to know my medical conditions just hit those out of the park.

I loathe the overuse of gaslighting nowadays but that’s what all of this has felt like for me. Being told by the same GP she doesn’t know if I’m anaemic or not, when I can see my own blood results online and my Hgb was 8.8. Literally begging to be referred for her to say she’d doubt they’d accept the referral (no surprises that she was correct there).

But…

for some reason she’d referred me to two different hospitals a month apart, I think she may have forgotten the original referral. Well that original phone appointment just happened this afternoon, and I fully expected it to be the same as the other hospital 2 weeks ago. But this consultant more or less said do you want the surgery? And when I said yes he said alright, I’ll arrange that for you.

I could cry. Even if it’s not for 2 years, just knowing I’m on the list is more than I’ve ever had. I know it won’t solve everything, and maybe it’s not even endo, maybe it’s ‘just’ heavy periods. But I’ll know. He’s the first HCP to ask what I want and listen to me. For years and years. I first saw someone about my periods and pain when I was 18, I’m 33 now.

I don’t know why two London hospitals could have such different responses. But there’s still some hope out there.

Even if the answers can't be provided in this chat, these are still reasonable questions to raise when debating it so that potential data issues and other viewpoints/ inputs can be considered, it's part of critical thinking rather than taking things as red ----

I could cry for you, just knowing that in 2 years time you will be pain free every day of the month without dreaded periods. It solves the issue of bleeding and the associated distress and pain caused. My daughter also has a lot of scar tissue from so many operations, but she’s better without the useless half a uterus.

Just as we thought she was turning a corner she started with some strange sensations, after a full body MRI she has been diagnosed with the same brain tumour as Davina McCall, a colloid cyst, it’s just 2mm smalle than Davina, they don’t want to operate just yet. After seeing the brain surgeon he picked up on reflection tests that one side of her body wasn’t responding, referred onto a neurologist who has diagnosed FND 🤦‍♀️. I kid you not you couldn’t make it up, I’ve been very tearful this week, reading about Davina then on the Jeremy Vine show today how women are being let down by gynaecology and the awful journey we’ve had with our daughter. Life certainly isn’t a dress rehearsal, not in our house, it’s anything but.

Sadly it might. I had unreasonably heavy periods GP fobbed off. I got sicker and sicker ended up presenting at A&E breathless with palpitations. Ended up needing transfusion and then biopsy results confirmed pre-cancerous cells in endometrium. Until then for a year I'd just been told to take an iron supplement as some women get heavy periods and to get on with it. Gynae issues are just not taken seriously by many.

Agree it's underfunded and that many just don't care.