NHS - Useless bunch some of them

[SIRandyraven]

Had a large cyst on neck and got taken in for a local operation and kept in for 4 nights on a antibiotic drip.
NHS ward was good and even the food was ok ...shock horror ...
Got private health insurance , so got paid £200 a night for going NHS.
Appointment to see consultant 6 weeks later ...NHS all went well.
Told to call back in July and make a follow up appointment.
Did and told they would write with date and time.
Got letter saying make an appointment ...so called and they said ...Yes you have an appointment ignore letter....get another letter ...so call them and they say ...oh sorry you have no appointment ...only date available now is August ...eeerrr ..I'm away in August on business ...does he do private ...yes ...
call his secretary ...and asked when would you like to come ...This Wednesday please ...yep ok no problem ...
Seems he so busy doing private , the NHS patients have to wait ....
Two tier system this NHS ...

[Greedyfly]

Bad communication happens in every business. I have had nothing but dealings with the NHS over the last year or so and have had good treatment. My private treatment was better but I could not fault the NHS teams that have helped me so far.

[SIRandyraven]

Yep and business that continue to communicate badly with customers go bust...
The NHS limps along ....feel sorry for people late in age and without the sense and whereabouts any more in later life and get caught out ...waiting for appointments they have lost in the admin system.
While I was in , they tried to give me wrong tablets one morning ...large red pill instead of two small white pain killers ....god knows what they tried to give me and what it was for ...looked across ward at 85 year old chap and thought ...he would have never known if he was given that red pill ...he would have just taken it ...
So scared of getting old and ending up in a ward and being put to a slow death via starvation and lack of care on a NHS ward ...
also watched trays of food arrive ...person took sick to eat and sleeps ...tray taken away full of food by some kitchen assistant 2 hours later ...another meal missed by some poor sod ...
At least at the moment I can afford to go private ...but when I'm in my 80's ...will be another story ...

[Greedyfly]

That is one hospital though. Don't get me wrong I have my complaints, for instance I have had to have three surgeries when the first should have fixed my problem but what can we do?

I have known a few hospitals and some are better than others. All I can suggest is make a complaint to them.

[jake-the-peg]

Businesses that fail to communicate well with customers go bust?

Presumably you've never used an electricity company or travelled by rail then?

[rowanwitch]

Honestly it isn't always like that,,,, but some consultants do prioritise their private work...at the same time we have others who refuse to work privately as it goes against everything they became doctors for... Yes you do get what you pay for. but my worst inpatient experience was as a private patient... never again .....the nursing care was appalling,

[woofgang]

If you have problems with the NHS then complain please!!! Staff aren't taken notice of but if someone tough and articulate complains it gets dealt with. Like anyone else, consultants are free to work where they please. If they choose to do eg 3 days private and 2 days NHS that is their choice. The NHS only pay them for the work they do. They have certainly put the hours in as housemen and juniors!!
(gosh never thought I'd hear myself stand up for a doctor, I had enough run ins with them before I retired lol)

[SIRandyraven]

Ex State owned monopolies ....lol

No I don't have electricity ...we live by candle light ...also don't use trains ...
No only joking , we have gas lamps.

[Greedyfly]

Lol

[merciasounds]

to follow on jake's post, or a gas company, phone company, tried to get something delivered...I speak as I find, they've always been brilliant with me. But I take your point of the food and the elderly, or the wrong drugs is unforgivable.

[rowanwitch]

Actually Woofgang is right...more change happens because articulate people complain especially where there is a clinical risk

[SIRandyraven]

Wish we had an American system to be honest ...
My firm pays £100 a month for my private cover ..
I paid £356 in NI last month and going up soon ...!!!
My employer paid NI of £495 ....
Imagine the private health insurance cover I would get for that !!!!

[jake-the-peg]

Amazing isn't it how not being state owned anymore and opening them to competition has done absolutely nothing to improve them - in the case of the Railways probably made them substantially worse.

Thing is wheen people get bad service from a public service like the council or the NHS they blame it on them being state run

When they get bad service from a private company they don't blame it on it being a private company

It's very easy to be selective and ignore things that don't fit the required conclusion

[jake-the-peg]

Not much when you retire or get to be a high risk that's for sure!

NI doesn't just cover the NHS but the *average* health insurance for a familly was $13,000 last year

[SIRandyraven]

Most of the nurses 95% of them were amazing ....
Some of the nurses were just there to do a job ...one or two were lazy ...but 95% of them were amazing ...and a few were just born to do the job ...they were caring and enjoyed the job...
I could never ...ever ...whatever money they offered me ...be a nurse ...

One of the nurses , who was amazing ...she cared ...even for those too sick to even know she was there ....was in tears on day ...out of eye sight ..I passed and asked what was up ...and she would not say ...but it turned out the managers and admin people were making her life hard at work ....she just wanted to get on with being a nurse ...

[Greedyfly]

I have just rung my local doctors surgery to book an appointment after 5pm (the surgery closes at 6pm) and they refused?!

Apparently they don't do surgery app's after 5pm? what is that about? What do they do for the last hour of the day?

[SIRandyraven]

My local doctor is fantastic ...live in a village ....she knows everyone ...
She waited about last week ...after 6pm ...to give me a tetanus injection , after I called to ask for one . I stood on a nail in the street while at work in London ..Grrrr ...it was a packing case nail with a white plastic collar that made it stand vertical ...great ...went into bottom of show and into bottom of my foot ....

[SIRandyraven]

*shoe

[Sqad]

Sirandy......have you just found out that the NHS has a two tired system? It always has had.

Woofgang....the problem comes when the NHS does not pay you for what you do.

[Zeuhl]

My experience of Private and NHS is that the only advantages Private offers is speed i.e. beat the Q and more of a hotel experience in accommodation and food.

Generalising I have found the best standards of surgical consultant and nursing to be in the NHS.

Private surgeons are very keen to get on with it and spout success rates that later prove to be bogus whereas in the NHS, surgeons are more reticent and cautious.

Some of the nursing care in Private hospitals (often from ill trained and inexperienced agency nurses) is criminally bad.
.

[Sqad]

Zeuhl.........I respect your comments but they have not been my experience.