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OK, it's not the NHS, it's someone / a Department (maybe orthopaedics, maybe admin)
I had an incident at the start of Nov; going to run across a busy road to take advantage of a gap in the traffic, my knee went pop. Instant agony, no weight bearing, etc.
I waited / RICEd it but not really improving, so I got a physio appt via my GP. Physio has diagnosed a meniscus tear externally, but I need a scan to decide what to do. That was late November that I was referred to orthopaedics who will then decide what other tests to do, and I have been waiting since. 4 months, all but. I know they're busy, and while my QoL is all ****ed up in the grand scheme it's probably not serious compared to some.
My appointment was today. And consequently cancelled because of the strikes. I accept and support the need to take action. The person that phoned me to cancel my appointment said I'd get a new appointment in the post.
Which has arrived today. For late August. > 5 months away. Whereas the first one was just under 4 months. Total 9 months just to get seen.
AIBU to be pissed off that it seems very much like I haven't been 'rescheduled', I've just been shoved to the end of the waiting list again. Is there anything I can do?
Private health insurance is the easiest answer to what you can do.
But I'm guessing you mustn't have it
“ Private health insurance is the easiest answer to what you can do.
But I’m guessing you mustn’t have it”
and playing straight into the Tory endgame.
**** up the NHS to a point where joe public welcomes private health care as the only solution.
resist people , resist.
Get pissed off at the right people. In this case our utterly **** inept government.
Oh, I'm pissed off with them, for sure.
But irrespective of what is driving the conditions in the NHS, I still want the people working there do do a decent job and being shoved right to the back of the queue doesn't feel like that's being done. Whether this is a lazy admin or a departmental edict, or what IDK, just doesn't feel like any care is being taken.
It might be worth a phone call to the consultants secretary to try to get a chat with the consultant and / or asking your GP to intervene
Yes you have probably gone back to the back of the queue because that was the first available slot - to take you any earlier ( and allthe other folk cancelled today) might well mean everyone on the list gets bumped down. Simplest way for them to deal with it is do what they have done.
the above steps are what I would try. dunno how effective it would be - not a lot probably
I've been waiting 2 years for a dentist......
February 2021, got an emergency appointment, cavity cleaned out and a dressing put on. Told it should last 6 weeks or so untill I can get it fixed permenantly.
April 2021, got an actual appointment, told that the NHS won't actually do a root canal inspite of what the guidelines say as the money they get for one doesn't even cover half the procedure, so it's extract or nothing. And they botched the extraction. So now I'm back on a waiting list with an even more sore tooth.
Referred to the dental hospital.
June 2022, missed call from an unknown number.
January 2023, letter arrives saying that as they've tried to call me twice (presumably the 2nd my phone was out of reception entirely so I didn't even have a missed call listed on the phone) they've now referred me back to the original practice.
Phone them up and point out that this is utterly ridiculous and got a "computer says no".
Guess I'm waiting another ****ing year then for a missed call that I'll hopefully be somewhere with signal to receive. And that doesn't even get me onto the "waiting list", this is the phone call to book you into the waiting list.
You simply won’t be a priority is my guess. Not life threatening so back of the queue possibly.
It's just the way of the world now, been waiting on my hip replacement for nearly 2 years now, was put on the priority list about a year ago for private op, but it's just the vastness of the waiting lists, not sure why you're going to an ortho appointment if they physio recommends a scan, you should be getting scanned then going to ortho, not much they'll do without the scan?
Simplest way for them to deal with it is do what they have done.
Simplest for them, for sure. And a big f'you to me and everyone else shovelled back.
I don't like to feel pissed off at 'The NHS' it's an absolute jewel for so many reasons. But doesn't give them a free hit on everything.
This seems pretty standard at the mo. I know somebody who has been waiting for several years for something way more serious, living in pain on a daily basis. Their original operation was cancelled 2 years ago. I know others who have died, and I'm not convinced they would have had they received care quicker.
Mrs_oab waited 6 months for an emergency respiratory consultant appointment due to post covid pressures.
The consultant left the week after her appointment with no follow up. The NHS are unable to recruit a consultant currently.
Her second appointment (to check progress of pulmonary fibrosis ) should have been in December. They're unable to give a date for any appointments until a new consultant is appointed - and they've got a 12 month backlog by now.
It seems the way of things.
and playing straight into the Tory endgame.
It's not all about politics. I've had it for 25 years because it makes sense. Doesn't need to be more to it than that
Most likely scenario is that there just isn't any capacity to slot you in any earlier. Still worth calling like TJ says but I very much doubt you'll get any results.
I've been waiting:
3 years for a Mental Health review (halfway through a course of treatment when COVID started).
2 years to have a worrying lump on my back looked at (referred by GP).
9 years to be able to register at a dentist, let alone get my cracked tooth fixed.
Remember that the NHS is on it's arse thanks to this govt's management. There just isn't any spare capacity in it, anywhere.
It’s obviously a service under enormous pressure but my (thankfully) limited interaction with the NHS in recent times has the air of being sufficiently difficult/slow/inefficient it has almost felt like that at so many levels staff are forcing me to have to have to consider resorting to private (self pay) care. And that riles.
Highly doubt a £200 solicitors letter is going to do anything.
If you have that sort of cash, you would probably be better off paying for a private MRI scan. You can get them done for £350 now in most areas. You’ll get a detailed report that should allow your physio to give you some good advice.
I’d also recommend paying for a physio appointment with someone that specialises in knee / sports injuries if you can.
Maybe it’s not “supporting the nhs” but you will be seen as low priority by the nhs and obviously your own quality of life is a much higher priority to you.
In this time the NHS budget has been increased to 12% GDP – a whisker off Germany at 12.2% and well above many countries in Europe that have better clinical outcomes.
citation for this? I do not believe its remotely true. NHS england wastes 10% of its budget on the fake market bureaucracy. I suspect the figures you have include all the money wasted on the test and trace system which never worked and the app that they tried to make
The whole issue with the NHS is one of political interference, poor management and huge lack of money - the backlog of maintenance for example is huge and will soak up loads of money
Dunno what the solicitors letter is expected to do. What are you going to put in it? Nothing has happened that can lead to legal actionthat Ican see.
If this happened at one of the hospitals I work at (different country but similar systems) I would call one of what the NHS calls PALS (Patient Advice and Liaison Service). They can look into this for you and in the right circumstances, and if you're very nice to them, may be able to get in touch with the bookings people. If they can't get you back up the list as would be fair, they may at least be able to get you in at short notice if there's a cancellation.
Making legal complaints should be an absolute last resort because it marks you out as making things difficult for at least one person that isn't paid particularly well to deal with this kind of thing. They are more likely to help someone that is nice to them.
It's shite.
It's happening everywhere
I feel for you, but I have no answers except "go private".
I HATE having to suggest that, but the NHS is broken.
"asking your GP to intervene" is a waste of time. Wet can't do anything and it takes up a GP appointment..
Interestingly, I reckon 10-20% of my appointments now are people who SHOULD have been seen by secondary care, but I'm keeping them afloat....
Not sure what the answer is.
Sorry
DrP
As DrP has said, the NHS is Fubar, from the ground up. Mrs works as a medical secretary for a GP practice, 18 months ago there were 5 full time Admin staff. Some have retired, 2 have left due to poor pay. they now have 1 full time staff member and the Mrs who works part time, and who is subsequently doing an extra 2 days per week to pick up the slack.
The pay is rubbish, so can't recruit decent staff, and there is nothing in the surgery budget to increase salary's. The impact on appointments due to the lack of staff, plus Covid, plus Dr's picking up the slack, plus a lack of social care....its just a mess.
I have a chronic illness and am experiencing just how broken the NHS has become. I’m waiting 6 weeks after hospital appointments/ tests/ scans just for a telephone call with my GP. It’s hopeless and is making me - and I’m sure many others - more and more unwell as anxiety and depression are now starting to become (possibly) contributory factors in my condition. I really need help and I just can’t get it.
I have private insurance through work and I’ve been using this for tests and scans etc but I really don’t think it’s too much to expect to be cared for in an a reasonable amount of time by my own GP.
We really need to fight to restore what we once had because at the moment, we might as well accept that the NHS has already, effectively gone.
I sympathise OP, I'm sorry that you're not sorted. Working in the NHS (all be it adjacently) it feels right now like we're clinging on barely. despite the huge sums of money being poured into it. A lot of what @hite-rite I agree with, I've worked in a private capacity with a Trust and had to take over the running of an ophthalmic outpatient unit, as there really wasn't the capacity or capability by the staff there to do it. They were understaffed, overworked and had no sort of understanding about what was required. It wasn't their fault, but it's the very end of a system that says "All resources must go to front line services" because that's the snappy line the MP want's to be able to tell their constituents. You get nurses and doctors doing management roles as a side-gig, and mostly (because it's a side gig) they don't pay attention to it aren't interested in doing it, and aren't (mostly) very good at doing it.
Some Trusts are amongst the most badly led, disjointed, and mismanaged organisations I've ever worked with- and I have daily contact with ICBs! Only last couple of months ago I saw an advert (that I think made it to the national press) for a Trust hiring or a Head of Diversity. No problem in of itself, but it's a £137,000 post. and a seat on the board...No doubt it's a requirement for them to recruit for it, it'll have been handed down to them from central government, I've no doubt that there's a national scheme to make sure each Trust has someone championing diversity, but read the ****ing room people.
Personally I see the days of the "Big white building" in the centre of town days are numbered. They suck up huge amounts of any local healthcare budget, but folks are increasingly not dying from the sorts of diseases that hospitals were largely created to manage. Until we have a system that's organised around preventing folks from ending up at them in the first place, or once they end up there, getting them out again just as fast, your healthcare budget will end up in the trouser pocket of some-one who's job it is to tell other folks to employ more brown people*
* who won't themselves be a...well, you all know how it works.
Unfortunately this is how it is now.
Back in the good old days when waiting list were manageable, Trust would only have to prioritise 6-8 weeks out. Now it can be having to prioritise 107 weeks +
So this creates issues in itself. The Bookings Team (or whatever its called in your local Trust) now have to spend time managing a huge long list , which they didnt before.
Clinicians can continually review the clinical waiting list and triage based on need, but this either takes them out of their clinical time, or they have to do additional sessions, except they do not want to do extra sessions because the tax system will charge them to do those extra sessions. Hopefully though since the budget yesterday this situation will ease a little, but it will not solve the issue that everything takes more time the longer a list becomes.
Unfortunately OP your condition is relatively minor (in the scheme of things) and therefore you are always going to be towards the back of the queue, even if the list is triaged.
Op for you as a patient its shit.
Contacting PALS./Legal is IMO not worth it and wasting even more NHS resource. If you are under a named consultant try contacting their secretary, given valid reasons why you should be a priority. There is nothing wrong either with contacting the bookings team (or equivalent) every month or so just to prompt where you are in the system. However many patients are now doing this and Secretaries and Bookings Teams are overwhelmed.
Like any system, when you operate within capacity things can be done effectively and efficiently. Once you go over capacity you either have to make a significant intervention or all efficiency is lost. People in the NHS have been shouting for years that things were going wrong, and no one listened.
be a nuisance, ring them daily,weekly
too much demand on the NHS, ageing population.
that said, for some injuries/accidents they are very very good.
i managed to put a big rip in the side of my thumb, with the pad hanging out, 4 weekends ago, went to A&E, sent to minor clinic, room of 20 people, i was called second, within 20 mins, sent to x-ray, thumb in iodine for 5 mins, wrapped up, asked if i could get to the plastics team at the bigger hospital.
missus drove me their, i saw a junior doctor within 10 mins, put me on the operation list 730am next morning,
i was all finished by 935am. had 3 after care appointments since, an amazing experience.
that said, i pulled an allnighter last summer at a&e, 845pm, and left at 620am, (didnt get seen till 5am) shoulder injury,
i've now got private health care, never paid for it, but my work have now decided you have to opt out, rather than opt in
be a nuisance, ring them daily,weekly
Please do not do this. You are just wasting folks time which is in short supply and it will not help
To respond to the thread title, yes I think YABU to blame "The NHS" rather than blaming the recent Governments which have run it down and the individual office which have (probably) lazily rescheduled you.
Would it make you feel better to be cross at "The NHS" as a whole though?
Oh and just on a side note - waiting list are rising quickly too in the private sector. Still nothing like as long as the NHS but 4-8 weeks is now not unusual for consultation and 6 months for surgery.
which have (probably) lazily rescheduled you.
I doubt they've lazily rescheduled you. If every appointment is booked for 5 months ahead ( likely) there is no appointment to offer you sooner without cancelling someone else who's been waiting jut as long.
If you want to complain, complain to your local MP whether they be labour or conservative.
I have yet to see a single politician come up with a solution to the NHS problems red or blue
I have yet to see a single politician come up with a solution to the NHS problems red or blue
Must be some given its obvious 🙂
1) Train more staff
2) remove the fake market in England - it absorbs 10% of the total budget and makes strategic planning difficult
3) fund it to a decent level
4) be honest about rationing and what treatments will not be offered
5) train / attract proper management - the quality in general is poor IME and surprisingly not enough management
6) Set up an NHS board and remove it from political interference. Health minster sets the priorities - thats it. the NHS board decides how this will be acheived. The amount of money time and effort wasted on reorganizations is horrendous
7) fund social care properly - this is the key one.
8) remove all private healthcare from the NHS bar the GPs ( they can be dealt with later)
9) charge private healthcare companies for the training of the staff they poach
9) tax all private healthcare providers
My wife is a Consultant therapy radiographer on a large cancer ward, specialising in Breast Cancer, they used to run their radiotherapy machines monday to friday 8-5, they are now running 7 days a week 10-12 hours a day.
A large part of her role now is trying to make sure they have staff to cover shifts and arrange patient appointments and follow ups, I have seen her in tears on more than one occasion because she is now at a point where she is having prioritise patients on just how sick they are, and pushing back less urgent cancer treatments, often for patients who are scared and down unsurprisingly.
They have so many staff leave, due to low morale, low pay, and lack of feeling like they are being listened to, often to go to jobs like working in Tesco and ignoring the 3-4 years training they had, as they cannot carry on. They cannot recruit as the bursaries and funding aren't there to encourage new staff, many Eastern European staff have left as they felt Brexit was a big "f*ck you" and they cannot retain good experienced staff as they are worn out and on their knees.
I've said before, my wife gets paid for a 35 hour week, and one of those days is supposed to be for her studies, she often works 80 hour weeks, she is sat on her laptop at home on a saturday and sunday, last week i caught her up at 4am on Monday morning as she was trying to play catch up as she'd dared to have the Thursday/ Friday off to spend time with daughter for half term.
She accumulates massive amounts of Time off in Lieu, but then can never take it.
To those that state the NHS is well-funded, i think you need to spend time in a busy hospital department and see the compromises made and the hours worked by many staff, often because they still believe in the NHS as an institution, certainly not for the money.
Which has arrived today. For late August. > 5 months away. Whereas the first one was just under 4 months. Total 9 months just to get seen.
AIBU to be pissed off that it seems very much like I haven’t been ‘rescheduled’, I’ve just been shoved to the end of the waiting list again. Is there anything I can do?
I do sympathise, this is totally unfair when it's not caused by the patient.
My dad had the same after it turned out the consultant was "on holiday" the day of his appt. Oh right, great, dad can just continue shitting blood for another few months then. 👍
To respond to the thread title, yes I think YABU to blame “The NHS” rather than blaming the recent Governments which have run it down and the individual office which have (probably) lazily rescheduled you.
You did read the first line of the post?
I'm less pissed off this morning and thanks for the sympathies and useful suggestions. I realise why it's happened and I know I'm not dying - the frustration of course is because as a previously active person I now can't do a fraction of what i could do moments before. I can't walk for more than about 25-30 mins, i can't run, and as an example if I lost footing briefly on ice as i did a couple of weeks ago, a 'stumble and catch' sends a searing pain into the knee and back to the crutch for a couple of days. Thankfully I can still ride, but not stood up - so MTB is out, road/easy gravel is possible but nothing steep. So not dying, but QoL is substantially down, as am I. I'm half considering what the GP said when they warned me of wait times at first consultation..... go for another run, **** it properly and get treated as an urgent case.
The other issue - picked up by physio - on a good day I'm limping, on a bad day I'm on a crutch, and I now am getting pain in hip and ankle because of the compensation for the limping. I know my family has a history of arthritis, and previous x-rays have shown 'clear deterioration but not bad enough yet, come back when it's properly ****ed'. By not getting treatment, I worry the job will be far bigger when the time does come.
I know the answer is go private but any savings i have managed to build are now there for paying for my son's counselling and eventually his op, which (with some justification) NHS aren't looking like able to fund.
So - rob a bank, or win the lottery?
You did read the first line of the post?
So were you asking that question or not?
Sheesh.
In our case (when my wife's neck went pop - she has suffered with it since a whiplash injury almost 16 years ago), she went to her physio who spoke to a consultant friend who put us on to a specialist in that particular type of injury who examined her and gave a report before referring us back to our local hospital. All on the NHS (apart from paying for an MRI scan in the first instance to get the ball rolling) and all happened in the first few days and weeks of it happening.
I am not saying it's right, or it's going to be the OPs way of sorting it, but it weirdly worked for us.
We're a nation living longer, but unhealthier and more injury prone, there's also the issue of having some triage in there, meaning if you're healthy apart from this, you're lower down the list.
I know the last time i had a MRI it was at 2100hrs in Southmead, they are running those machines as much as they possibly can, but each scan requires someone to then assess, then pass on to the GP/Department and so on.
It's just a sad fact that the list is long, and unfortunately gets longer when more are triaged in front of you.
My practical advice would be to call the MRI department directly, calmly explain your predicament and state that you would be very keen to be placed on their short notice cancellation list (presuming you can be flexible and this would work for you). A knee MRI on an ambulant patient takes about 20 mins and is the ideal study to slot in if a patient cancels/fails to attend.
As above - don’t waste £200 on a solicitors letter. £350 would get you a private knee MR.
PALS also good advice as they will contact the Radiology department regarding your case and may be able to help rectify.
it's not MRI that my appointment is with, it's with Trauma and orthopaedics who I assume will then refer me for follow up tests. As obvious as it seems to me that a scan is likely to be needed, I don't think I can order that myself.
I'm not even thinking about the potential for the T&O people to see me for two minutes, confirm I need a scan and then get on another long wait for that....
Simplest for them, for sure. And a big f’you to me and everyone else shovelled back.
I don’t like to feel pissed off at ‘The NHS’ it’s an absolute jewel for so many reasons. But doesn’t give them a free hit on everything.
What action would you like them to have taken when the doctors were on strike? I'm guessing you were hoping they would reschedule you for 2 weeks time and reschedule those people and so on down the list? Sadly that's a massive amount of admin, and there's no guarantee that you don't get pushed to another date they have a strike, that's still possible in August of course but somewhat less likely.
You may be surprised how affordable a specialist physio could be, and at the very least they may help stop it getting worse or aggravating the hip/knee in the meantime.
What action would you like them to have taken when the doctors were on strike? I’m guessing you were hoping they would reschedule you for 2 weeks time and reschedule those people and so on down the list? Sadly that’s a massive amount of admin
Being blunt - yes. Knowing of course how much that entails, and knowing in my heart of hearts it's impractical, yes it's what i would have liked. If they lost 3 days of appointments, everyone else on the list could have been moved to 3 days later. OK, there are implications to moving someone with a few days notice, but to insert the 3 days of cancellations in say 3 or 4 week's time and move everyone after that to 3 days later.....
In fact, and re "the list"; are appointments actually sent out 4-5 months in advance? My original for Mar15th - I've been waiting 4 months or so for the appointment but the invite was actually only sent out on Feb 21st. Maybe they already have a list that I've been on since my first referral in mid Nov, but if I wasn't told until only 4 weeks ago......if they're only firming up the dates and sending out invites 4 weeks or so into the future, someone with a date beyond that could easily be moved 3 days later if they haven't yet been told what their date is.
Hence the question about whether it's OK to feel pissed off that nothing like this has been done and instead it's just told to go to the back of the queue.
IANADr but have had a few friends with similar injuries, honestly if at all possible pay for an MRi and take it to a specialist physio. you can self refer for this or get an opinion from a specialist physio first to confirm its needed
Bluntly, you either need surgery and physio or you just need lots of rehab excercise and maybe a special support.
Any clinician is only going to know a 100% whats going on after a scan, either ultrasound or MRi but im pretty sure MRi is the gold standard. If you take the resulting report to a good physio who deals in these injuries, they will have a good idea if you will need surgery or not and therefore if you need to either wait on the NHS list or find the money privately.
IMHO thats the only way you are going to get some kind of resolution in the near future.
Again, its not my field but I'd be pretty sure that the admin involved in moving everyones appointments by a few days right down the list is a lot more complicated than it might seem
My son had an appointment to get his new wheelchair yesterday. Turned up and it wasn't built up, no-one thought to call us to cancel. this was a private company outsourced by the NHS.
OP - How much physio are you actually doing? Have you been given exercises? Even if they diagnose a tear and say surgery, you're on another waiting list and then a period of recovery/rehab.
My advice would be to do as much physio as you can to rehab it if you can. you may not even need surgery (would be good for surgery too). You'd be surprised.
organised sessions - about every 3-4 weeks.
The exercises she has set me to strengthen around the knee - every day / every other day depending on how it feels. Squats, hip raises, leg extensions against a resistance band, calf raises, etc.
Also -well aware that surgery is a last resort and preference is for conservative treatment, which I'm all for. But if I need an op, I want an op and then to get on with rehab and the rest of my life.
Stick at it. They'll want you semi rehabbed ahead of the op anyway.
When i did my acl I stuck at the physio and exercise. Never had reconstruction surgery. Best thing they did for me was the hydrotherapy pools.