what a mess!!!!!

[BikerMatt]

Is anybody watching the programme Ambulance on BBC 1?

What a total and utter mess!! 40 + people, mainly the elderly, brought in by ambulances, queued all the way down the corridors and waiting 6 hrs to be seen.

Ambulance staff, nurses and DR's working their tits off. Every member of these workers are saying they just can't cope.

Hope these Tory TW#S watched it!!!

[Catherine S]

Matt, a few weeks back we had a frantic call one lunchtime from my son who asked if we'd go to his house and look after the children while he went with my daughter -in-law in the ambulance to hospital because she'd been unresponsive after going back to bed that morning feeling poorly. At that point the paramedics, after assessing her at home, decided it was the best thing because she was very drowsy, almost out of it and they didn't know why.

He called after a couple of hours to say that she was still in the ambulance in a queue outside the hospital, waiting to be admitted for further assessment. She was coming around gradually but he was still worried about her. It turns out it was a combination of some very strong antibiotics she'd taken the day before to treat a water infection and strong painkillers she'd taken that morning and was back recovering at home that night, but I was appalled by the 'queue' of ambulances waiting to have their patients admitted...i'd never heard of that before

Cath

[mezzaninedoor]

Indeed the NHS has many challenges at the moment.
Ive not heard of ambulances queueing up outside hospitals though I have heard of the ambulance service running out of ambulances.

We have lots of challenges though that will need some reformative ideas and I think an acceptance that we will just have to pay more tax.

We have an ageing population and diabetes & obesity epidemics along with mental health services that have not been fit for purpose for some time.

The NHS is still though acknowledged as one of the best healthcare systems in the world and we spend less on our healthcare in the UK than the USA, France and Germany by some margin.

[Catherine S]

Mezz, having lived in Germany for some years, ive come to the conclusion that we Brits keep on saying the NHS is one of the best in the world because we want it to be so, we want to believe it's as great as it once was, but the reality is completely different these days and has been for some time. I do agree though, that it could be improved by paying more into the system. In Germany we paid about half more again and their health system was wonderful.

Cath ☺

[MyNameIsTerry]

It's bad now but I can remember similar issues decades ago too. People waiting on trollies in corridors. Back in the nineties we had 16 hour waits and more in A&E around here. People waiting years for operations. I can remember my grandad (back in the mid eighties) being relieved when they finally agreed to amputate his leg as he spent years in pain because they wouldn't do anything.

That's why I'm sceptical about the media and which party the media outlet leans towards as it's "boo Tory's" with some no matter what just as the Tory supporting papers spend their days bashing Labour (And Labour media bash Corbyn as he's not "their Labour").

I was glad to see Hunt gone but it was just a shuffle because May needs Brexit supporters so is stuck for ministers. What did the guy ever achieve other than annoying everyone?

One of the biggest problems with the elderly is the social care sector. It's private. It isn't even well governed by the government themselves so it's just another runaway sector.

Even if we sort the NHS out so there are enough beds & staff the minute the elderly start coming in we are still screwed. Where are they going to send them to once they are treated? Many sit waiting to go into a temporary home.

Both Tory & Labour sold the cottage hospitals off to save cash and now we are reaping the whirlwind of that as these places were great for this type of thing. There is one 10 minutes walk from me and the local save the hospital group have been fighting both Tory & Labour (Tony Blair was in charge when they were shutting the wards down too) because every few years there seems to be another ward they want to close to save cash.

Austerity has caused so many problems. But what about when it wash going on under boom or bust? Why were our cottage hospitals closing wards when Labour were pumping cash in? And why bid Blair bring in PFI for the NHS? PFI is currently draining cash off the NHS budget to the private sector.

But here's the thing that always annoys me. Tell the public taxes need to go up by a few % to sort the NHS out and how many will moan they can't buy their cigs & beer, their Xboxes, their holidays?

We are living longer so we need to be putting more in to cover those years. And the population is greatly increasing causing more demand now and further down the line. Plus doctors seem to love medicating the elderly to the point of them rattling and I wonder if it's all needed? GP's have been happy to push the elderly into A&E and now finally they are being told it's their job, quite rightly too.

The more the NHS expands, it's not anything like what it was conceived to be, the more we have to feed it. Mental health is still way off being decent yet we can't afford to keep the whole NHS going as it is so how can it get better?

I would be happy to vote for a party who said they would increase taxes to sort out healthcare and social care. But the reality seems to be they won't stand a hope in hell.

More than money is needed too. All public sectors are notorious for waste. So we really need so many managers? The NHS pay great wages. I've considering applying for a few analyst positions in the past and you should see how much over the going rate they pay. I get that they want good people but I question whether they get value for money.

We don't want an American system. But systems like Germany and Australia seem interesting. I know in Germany they use a trust system where the funds are managed responsibly. It seems to work for them.

[Carnation]

In my experience any trip to the hospital via ambulance results in trolley queuing in the hospital corridor. I had this with three sets of parents, even in severe cases when my dad broke his neck. My late father also told me he had an experience in the 1970s when he had a bad accident that he was left in the corridor then.
We might have progressed with medicine, but general care and comfort is abominable in my opinion.
They carried my mum by her arms and legs like a bundle of laundry when she was released from hospital and I saw through a crack in the door of her room how they tipped her off the trolley on to bed from a reasonable height and distance. I've seen and experienced far too much, which is why I have a phobia of hospitals and white coats!
Ambulance crews lie as well. They convince you to go to hospital as a matter of emergency and just leave you for hours on your own. Everything goes through A&E, so you have noise and serious things going on all around you. Doctors and nurses are tired and grumpy from long shifts. Both my mum and partners mum had their rings stolen. You become dehydrated waiting to be seen.
Oh, I could rant on all day.
The system hasn't worked for years and years and years!!!!

---------- Post added at 09:28 ---------- Previous post was at 09:15 ----------

Terry, care homes are at capacity levels already.
You are right, some of them are hanging around waiting in hospital for a placement or someone to die.
My worry is the possible mistreatment of morphine and the '1984' system predicted by George Orwell

So many hospitals have closed when they should be opening new ones. It takes an hour to get to the hospital where I am, when it used to be 5 minutes. They now have to use helicopters for serious cases, surely that is far more money?

[MyNameIsTerry]

One of our hospitals closed, Carnation. It was a hospital that had been subject to a scandal though. Shutting it's A&E now means a much farther journey and that can't be good when every minute counts?

The current Gosport scandal shows another very worrying attitude by doctors towards the elderly.

[Phuzella]

I'm afraid this country is going downhill. Not just the NHS bur in general. It's a shame :(

[Carys]

I feel so sorry for the excellent committed and skilled NHS workers who just aren't able to do their job as they want to, in calm and effective conditions. I looked up our local area on the 'see how your area performs with targets' and - ours was awful, and near the bottom of the 135 listed health authorities. (apart from for mental health, where it was near the top!?) These targets remind me of those that appeared with the national curriculum so many moons ago - totally unrealistic and unattainable.

[Magic]

I watched the TV programme it was our local hospital Royal Stoke last night.
A lot has changed since 2016.

I had to ring 111 in the middle of the night that summer.
My hubby was having really bad pains and vomiting.
A ambulance came within 15minuets ,third trolly in line ,In cubicle 20mins.
Went to having tests. Kidney stone. Bed soon found for him.
To cut this short. Could not remove the stone. Stent put in.

2018 My sister age 85 waited all night on a trolly with her daughters waiting with her all night for a bed on a ward.. this happed a few times this year. Sadly my sister passed away earlier this year.

Staff shortages. No beds.