****** NHS box tickers. I need to vent
KT53
Posts: 9,009
Because of concern about my wife's medical condition her GP wanted her to be seen within 2 weeks. We live about 3 miles from one large hospital and 7 miles from another. Did she get an appointment at either of these? No. At a hospital over 30 miles away. Because she was advised not to drive because of the nature of the examination she was due to have I had to take 1/2 day off to take her. I have no problem with doing that per-se.
My wife went in for her appointment bang on time and was out again in under 10 minutes. All she had was a short conversation with the consultant but no examination because the equipment required for the examination is not held at that hospital. It's a small community hospital out in the sticks.
To add to the stupidity, the consultant arrived at the hospital at the same time we did, having driven from the hospital 3 miles from our home.
My wife now has the added stress of waiting for a new appointment at one of our local hospitals.
Wife ****** off, me ****** off, consultant ****** off. The only people who will be happy are the local NHS administrators because they can tick the box to say my wife was seen within the required 2 weeks 
Posts
Perhaps your terrible experiences give some idea what it was like to be a clinician in the NHS for over 30 years, and maybe why I eventually lost my marbles.
I can only hope you get your problems sorted, and as I am sure you know, most of the clinical staff are caring and dedicated.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
Luckily I have a car, but if I didn't...................
KT53. I certainly sympathise with you. There seems to be all sorts of strange things going on within the NHS. I'm just so thankful I got my very successful hip replacement 5 years ago. Even then some things were less than as they should have been. In February this year though, my son-in-law was rushed into intensive care and for several weeks we didn't know whether he would live or die or if he did live what the repercussions were likely to be. By chance the consultant who saw him had seen the particular problem before and got him the treatment he needed. He went back to work in October and has just come off the last major medication. The medical staff can and do pull out all the stops but like many occupations it's the ones not at the coal face who don't have quite the same committment
Stupid imposed targets. Don't know whose idea that was but he/she needs shooting. All government employees from the bosses to the coal-face workers are slaves to them and all are made less efficient because of them
Welshonion, this happened to me last year so I rang them and arranged to go to the more local one. It's organised by post code from 'the centre' and they have no idea of which is where in rural areas.
If your wife was referred under the two week wait system, you need to speak to the gp amd get her re-referred to the appropriate hospital under the same system
sadpy, there are many chains of paper pusher just to get the correct appointment
As p'doc says those on the frontline are as frustrated as those on the receiving end - I don't really know what the answer is - I suspect nobody does. Depressing but true. Hard to see when a solution will come to the fore.
Rant over....
I spent five hours today, with dad at the hospital for pre op assessment. He promised the nurse he would try to eat a bit and drink more, and do a bit of exercise. When we got home , he went straight to bed, refused to eat or drink..the NHS is doing its best, but the family are made out to be lying bullies, and I've wasted two days so far this week, when dad wont even try to help himself
I probably ought to put this on the rant thread, I'm just so annoyed with him.
My wife is going to contact her GP tomorrow although the consultant said today that she will contact her anyway.
It would seem that even the original appointment was ****** up. The day after her appointment with her GP there was a message on our answering machine for her to call the appointment centre. She called and was told that the hospital we went to today was the only one in the area where she could be seen in the timescales so she had no option but to accept.
We got home last Friday to a letter from the same appointment centre telling her she had not attended an appointment at our local hospital on the 5th for the same purpose as the appointment today (hopefully you are still following this). As you can guess, no appointment for the 5th had ever been offered. If it had been it would have been taken up on rather than having a 60 mile round trip.
My wife actually checked with the consultant today about the supposed appointment on the 5th and the consultant had nothing to indicate that my wife had an appointment that day!