Frustrated with the "health" system...

galah

Just a rant, more than anything...

I am really, really p*ssed off with the whole health situation in this country! It's an absolute joke (and I just need to get my story off my chest...)

First of all, all the doctors I've seen so far have been massively incompetent - starting with one GP who sent me for X-rays for a problem with my wrist where clearly nothing was broken (RSI induced strain) I spent 6 hours in A&E, and was sent home by a really irritated doctor with some painkillers (he was irritated, cause I had no place to be there, clogging up the system).

Then I had a rather nasty case of a chest infection, picked up on holidays abroad. The doctor listened to my complaint, and prescribed antibiotics. These didnt work, nothing changed. So instead of checking it out more closely, he just prescribed another course of the same antibiotics...It took me 3 weeks to recover...

But this is not the worst - I have started to develop a nasty case of RSI/tendonitis/wrist problems. Went to see the company doc - she treated me, and took some blood samples. These came back, and she suspected hemochromatosis. She took some more samples, and told me to ring back in 4 weeks. Rang back - just to find out she was on a workplacement, and had left the clinic. WTF? And they never sent my samples off (to Belfast...), but they might do it now, it will take another 6 weeks though. HUH? Why not send the stuff to any other third world country - I'm sure I'll get the diagnosis back faster, really!

In the meantime, I was treated for tendonitis by a rheumatologist - who keeps insisting on injecting cortisone, althoug it has not helped one bit. She does not recommend alternative therapies. So now I'm left with this problem that does not get better, with an annoying consultant and no GP.

And I'm paying an awful lot of money for this "priviledge". Don't get me started on Bupa though...

And I have lots more stories - my boyfriend was treated for a hernia (which they found after a year and a half complaining about stomach ache...) - and while they "fixed" that, they managed to damage his appendix so bad that a week later he had to have another operation to get the appendix removed. Total time in hospital: 2 Weeks. Time spent on a trolley in A&E the day before Paddy's day: 24 hours. Staff was nice and did their best under the circumstances, but still...24 hours on a trolley with all the drunks, and an appendicitis?

it's a f*cking joke, it really is...How difficult is it to have competent doctors who actually know what they're doing and won't charge an arm and a leg? How difficult could it be to set up an efficient health system where people are treated properly, and don't have to wait 6 weeks for test results, cause they need to be sent to another country?

Mind you, my problems are only minor in comparison - I would not want to be seriously ill here...

/rant over

ferdi

Mary Harney will be visiting UCD Belfield tonight at around 7/7.30, for a public debate on the Health System, organised by the UCD Society of Medicine. Other contributers will include George Hook.

anyone interested should attend in order to mercilessly heckle the minister over the state of our countries health system.

FillSpectre

Bad doctors do not make the the whole health service a joke in my eyes. Your GP and your specialist are idiots according to you. Doctors don't often tell you why they run tests so as not to upset the patient.

your GP is not the health system and neither is the "company" doctor. The health service people complain about is the public health system.

I get you are frustrated but effectively people you employ and have control over are more your problem then a system you can do nothing about.

- bo -

galah wrote:

And I have lots more stories - my boyfriend was treated for a hernia (which they found after a year and a half complaining about stomach ache...) - and while they "fixed" that, they managed to damage his appendix so bad that a week later he had to have another operation to get the appendix removed. Total time in hospital: 2 Weeks. Time spent on a trolley in A&E the day before Paddy's day: 24 hours. Staff was nice and did their best under the circumstances, but still...24 hours on a trolley with all the drunks, and an appendicitis?

something like that happened meself last week. while waiting for what they called 'emergency surgery' (which took them a day and a half to do), i spent my first night sitting in the A&E for hours, then moved onto a trolley in the corridor of the hospital for another couple of hours, before being told i could sleep for the night on a different trolley in one of the treatment rooms. 30 people were waiting on beds. fortunately enough i got a bed for the next couple of nights. the staff did try their best though, they were very nice, and one of them actually said that she hoped we would complain about the situation.

galah

FillSpectre wrote:

Bad doctors do not make the the whole health service a joke in my eyes. Your GP and your specialist are idiots according to you. Doctors don't often tell you why they run tests so as not to upset the patient.

your GP is not the health system and neither is the "company" doctor. The health service people complain about is the public health system.

I get you are frustrated but effectively people you employ and have control over are more your problem then a system you can do nothing about.

I am sorry, but they do - because under the "system" (i.e. the government) these doctors are allowed to practise, no matter what. So they are part of the system, like it or not. And a system that charges exorbitant amounts for health care while not delivering results is, IMO, a "joke". And I haven't mentioned half of the problems I had with doctors here (I had to point out things to doctors before they even ran tests, etcetc). So incompetent doctors are part of the problem!

Procrastinator

Look, we all complain about the system, but when's the next election? Gotta make every politician know that we all mean business, and want answers. The main problem is that the entire health system is organised around the Hospital Consultant. They have to be tackled. And GPs, at least you can choose and complain.

I was given really bad advice by a GP once and I questioned him, he got embarrassed and changed the prescription, because I knew a little bit about what I should have been advised.
I think everyone should question the GP all the time. A good doctor should be able to give you a rationale for what they're doing.
Like: If you think it's a tendon problem why are you sending me for an X ray? Isn't this unnecessary? Personally, I think he had to outrule any other cause for your symptoms.
The blood test, this may have been overkill or perhaps not. Have you asked who put a hold on the test, because it sounds like that's what happened? Ask them who stopped it, and if the answer's no, then ask why doctor's instructions aren't being carried out in that clinic, get an explanation from the manager/head honcho or whoever. We have to start treating these medical people as real people like us; just as liable to be questioned as to what they're doing and why, as the rest of us are every day.
Last thought, Doctors can't be disciplined by anyone but themselves. This is a huge problem and it means that a person's only recourse is court and that means it has to have been a really serious issue.
There shouild be an independent board or body of some sort, with LAY representation, that's with some non-doctor, non-expert members to scrutinise these people.
Anyone who says that this isn't practical and that Lay people couldn't understand 'complicated' medical issues, means
1. that they haven't been able to explain adequately (their problem)
and
2. that we non-doctors or non-experts are capable of making these kinds of difficult decisions, in groups, every day. They're called juries.
Good luck

galah

looking forward to next election - problem is, I am a foreigner, and can't vote...pain, really...

I do question doctors, but I've found that they do what they want anyway. The only choice I have is not to carry out their instructions and look for a different GP (paying in full again)...In my case, with the blood tests, I had no choice either - the "workplacement doctor" had left (without telling me), and I guess she just forgot to send my samples off (or something like that...) I'm all for human error and that mistakes may happen, but this is a bit much...

I kinda feel that when I pay a substantial amount to see a doctor, that they diagnose correctly, and tell me what's going on every step of the way, and why. I should not have to ask and question everything they do - they should tell me...

Much of this thread seems to be a complaint about individual GPs and bad diagnoses. Frankly, that's hardly something that can be traced back to the Government, unless in each case they qualified in the past few years and there was something remiss about the system when they passed their exams. There are bad doctors in every country in the world. Do the opposition propose to dismiss all GPs and force them to resit exams or something or is this another excuse to blame the Government for something, anything at all. I know GPs would say they are guilty of one thing - because of the litigious nature of the Irish population - and that is over-caution eg. sending everyone off for an xray.