I know people have commented on here about the state of the NHS and the poor government funding but that really passed me by because our Health System in different states is under pressure but today this article appeared on the ABC News web site today. It makes the situation sound dire.
Some quotes:
“Then we can’t get the ambulances out to patients who need them because they’re stuck in our car parks.”
At least one in three patients who presented to the emergency departments waited four hours to be seen,
“We’ve had stories of people having to examine patients in cupboards, and of eight-plus-hour-waits in the back of ambulances.”
Please read the article first but I would be very interested to hear your comments afterwards.
Bruce I have to say that based on recent experience with an elderly parent, I don’t think this is a problem with hospital services, but is rooted in weaknesses in GP care. I’ve had to argue with our mum’s GP that she doesn’t need to go to A&E. The GP doesn’t want to take the risk. Rapid response do not want to take the risk. Too many patients who could be treated in the community (if the community was strong) are being routed to A&E. A&E cannot cope with this because they are meant to be for emergencies.
Now all GPs are fully qualified doctors. I just think there are not enough GPs to go around. So this is not a problem in hospitals. It’s a problem at GP level. If you look at what GPs have to cope with in this country you would understand why they are at breaking point. The level of bureaucracy is just ridiculous. They are all private contractors. The contracts are very complicated. Many have retired as it’s just not worth the grief.
It goes back to the history of our health service. Originally all these doctors were private and when the NHS was created they were invited to NHS contracts whilst remaining private. The model has never worked too well. But the amount of pressure on them now is just unmanageable. It’s been orchestrated to make the whole system implode.
No one ever had a nice A&E experience, no one was ever made to feel welcome: "poor you, come into the warm, take a seat … ", nah, it’s cold soulders all round. It’s an old tactic hospitals use, keep 'em waiting all day/night, dicourage them from coming back again too soon.
A little hiccup like some striking nurses or ambulance crew doesn’t help, and draws attention to the trollies in corridors …
I had some excellent A&E experiences before the Lansley health and social care act. One thing Blair’s government did well was to hugely improve NHS services at the time. I had several A&E experiences when I was having severe allergic reactions. The wards were clean, the staff were calm and the service was fabulous. In the last few years services started to deteriorate substantially. This happened during the austerity era and was then compounded by Brexit and Covid. I noticed this when I have had to use urgent care centres. The neglect has been clear. I was shocked by the recent A&E experiences last year. It’s so different from the model in place ten years ago.
Well there’s nothing new about people waiting on trollies in corridors, but it’s got worse now because many hospitals (here in London at least) have closed down their A&E department altogether (Cameron/Osbourne austerity), doubling the load on other hospitals.
But, whatever political era you’re in, you will always have to wait many hours knowing you are being kept waiting deliberately. However you always go away fixed up and feeling grateful.
It has been suggested that the shortage of doctors and hospital staff is due to the fact that many were dismissed, left, or went private, for refusing to be vaccinated…The same can also be said about pilots and air crew. Yes! Yes! I know all the excuses, but it remains one of the major elephants in the room…And we are not allowed to discuss it…
Closing down so many A&Es definitely hasn’t helped anyone. But the new legislation encourages even more collaboration between hospitals leading to further mergers and that’s when they decide it’s a good idea to close A&Es locals rely on. They should also open up more urgent care / walk in centres to take pressure off A&Es but instead these are being run into the ground or closed which is a false economy as we have seen.
I don’t believe any hospital makes people wait deliberately. They just have limited medics who have to deal with the priority life & death cases before seeing others. They just don’t have enough capacity and by that it’s usually staff. I was seen very quickly with an allergic reaction. But when I had abdominal pain I had to wait hours. If they have capacity they will see people v quickly.
i once worked in the NHS in my far younger days - what I read now is appauling and for a country that once ran a great empire amazingly stupid. I think the only thing it is achieving right now is strongly discouraging any exiled brits to ever come back!!
I’m not exiled, I simply choose to live as in immigrant in another country. However I can confirm that the state of the UK as a whole (homelessness, cost of living, food banks, pot-holes, etc, etc) and particularly the state of the NHS does greatly discourage me from locating back to the UK. Here in France I got told off by a consultant for postponing an eye examination - they really want to see people as quickly & timely as possible. A friend here has been told she needs a knee replacement - told last week, appointment for surgery in September. Last year I had to go A&E - I was seen by the doctor in 20 minutes. The hospitals are clean, well staffed, well equipped and seem to run efficiently. Oh, and friendly too.
The UK was running too tight a health service before the pandemic and Brexit. Too few doctors, too few hospital beds, too little equipment - plus inadequate adult social care (which ends up placing an extra burden on the NHS). I imagine its only got worse. So you are 100% right, I’m not coming back.
I don’t suppose it’s got anything to do with the French sending us all of your undesirables?
And a population almost the same as the UK but an area nearly five times greater…
France population = 68 million
UK population = 68 million
Area of England = 130 km Squared
Area of France = 551 km Squared
the prblem lies in this country being overcrowded with thounds more entering the country legally or or illegally every year with out any health check first
the other issue is those that come over here for free medical treatment and hospitals don’t check to see if they are entitled or not,.
You should also acknowledge that France takes many more asylum seekers each year than the UK does.
As this thread was about the UK’s NHS, and even allowing for comparisons to other countries, I’m unclear what the land area of countries has to do with the health service. Especially when you cite England only - not the other parts of the UK.
I asked someone who was a manager in the NHS about this. Mainly because NHS entitlement comes with an NHS account number - so in theory people with no NHS number should be refused treatment or made to pay. I was told that whilst that is the theory, in practice it does not happen and people get treated.
The system I work with in France is much more clear cut. I have a “health card” that is pretty much a bank card for health treatments - plus a top up medical insurance for the last 25% of fees. Plus an identity card. The very first thing that happens in a hospital admission, at the doctors, even in A&E is that they verify you can pay. So its either the health card being swiped and the insurance policy being noted - or out with a credit card. So no-one comes to France expecting free medical treatment.
You mentioned your treatment at the hands of the local French Hospital Strath, so I did a rough comparison.
The land area versus the population is very important indeed as you well know. People in France are spread thinner on the ground and more hospitals can cope with fewer people.
A lot of the hospitals in the UK are past their sell by date and have not been extended or replaced to allow for the mass migration of people in the last twenty years or so.
If Brexit had been successful the borders would have been closed to all but the few who were trained in skills required here. But Brexit has not been done at all, and we still adhere to the same rules as we did as members, and the borders allow everybody and their wife into an already overcrowded country. What did you expect would happen?
I only site England because I live here and try to keep abreast of what is going on…Anyway, Wales and Scotland are full of mountains and not many people live there. I don’t know if Illegal Immigrants are sent there putting a strain on their resources.
I think there are other benefits - you can get billed for non-attendance. So if you feel to keep an appointment (doctor, hospital) the top up insurance won’t pay and you’ll still get the bill for the appointment. 29 euros for a doctor’s appointment. I know someone who got a bill for 30 euros because he’d registered in an A&E but after an hour or so decided he wasn’t so ill after all, so walked out. Non-attendance and got a bill. This cuts down on the waste and time wasting.
