“I (or my aunt etc) was waiting on a trolley for 100 hours” rant thread

A place to record your everlasting wait on a chair or (lucky you) trolley.

Own recent experience, SVUH ED on a chair 17 hours from midday Saturday to 7am Sunday, breakfast bags distributed. Already on IV antibiotics etc. Upgraded to a trolley from about 8am to 4pm up in surgical bay. About 4.30pm transferred to a bed, which transpired to be a super comfy one in the Private Hospital under public hospital remit. Splatter y this is commonplace with cases which are potentially surgical, eg appendix.

mariaalice

about 10 years I spent a night in ED it was an eye opener as to what goes on the amount with drugs, drink, and apparent mental health issues wandering about shouting and roaring. I then got a trolly in ED and then a bed in the private hospital.

archfi

18 months ago was advised by GP to 'get yourself immediately' to the A&E after having a 24hour halter monitor on me - BP was over 200 constantly over the 24 hours and two days before I'd had what I now know was a TIA in my right eye. I had zero physical symptoms or pain etc bar the fright of the TIA (which itself wasn't painful etc)

On a chair for 28 hours, a trolley for 6 hours then a bed for two weeks.

Now, awful amount of time as that was, there were people in terrible pain all on chairs/trollies for varying amounts of time while I was there so I guess I was lucky as I had zero pain thank God.

The care/aftercare I've had since (and during the 2 weeks in a ward) though has been 1st class, I cannot fault it even though my diagnosis tells me I probably won't be getting me buspass!

corner of hells

I bring my own trolley to A&E just to enjoy the ambiance.

Next year I hoping to get my own ambulance for trips to hospital.

griffin100

A bit of an opposite story........son broke his leg this year. Entered the private system via a private clinic and got an appointment with a consultant surgeon in one of the private hospitals. Leg break required surgery within a few days or could be long term damage. The consultant told us to get ready to receive a call on Wednesday or Thursday with a slot. No call on Wednesday, no call by lunchtime Thursday. Rang the consultant's Secretary, was told that he had no availability and we were essentially on our own. At this stage my sons leg was in a bad way. We drove to University Hospital Waterford A&E and he was assessed, admitted overnight, had surgery the following morning and left the hospital 25hrs after arriving. Have to say, their triage and case management was excellent. He was home and recovering when we got a call from the private consultant with a slot for surgery the next day.

zell12

Once you get into the public system, it is world-class. We don't seem to recognise this.

Having said that population has risen hugely, aging population, massive demand on services, longer wait times

ednwireland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121196147#Comment_121196147

I did 13 hours in A&E 10 years ago, no ward beds. August Bank Holiday Saturday. no sleep to be had with the numbers coming in and the trolleys aren't designed to be on for that length of time, think I was lucky as I had to have loads of monitoring so got a cubicle.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121196805#Comment_121196805

Private hospitals can be disaster areas, I spent two weeks in one in April with what I now know to me a sudden deterioration of pre-existing but unrecognised MS, discharged without any plan of follow-up as to what could be causing my “very unusual symptoms” as the general consultant put it. I soon learned from Prof Tubridy at the SVUH MS Clinuc that I had “very usual” symptoms of longstanding MS with a typical step like exacerbation. Private hospitals can left you down badly.

My recent admission was via SVUH, but like many abdominal abscess type cases (appendix, gallbladder, diverticula rupture etc) the following day these were moved to a trolley ward awaiting either surgery that day or/and followed by move to the private hospital which treats public cases. I got a private room as I had a chest infection owing to not being able to take deep breaths, and they wanted to isolate me in case I was infectious to others. The private hospital experience here was absolutely lovely, great food, cups of tea all day, everyone treating me very well.

raxy

I thought I was having a heart attack 1 night. Called an ambulance & had to wait over 45 minutes before it arrived. Was a Monday night

If it was a heart attack I'd probably have been dead before they got there.

They did an ecg & said my heart was fine & advised if they take me to hospital ud be left sitting in a chair for 24 hours without being seen. Told me to go to the doctor in the morning.

On the Friday they sent me to a&e because I'd need a ct scan to diagnose was in Tallaght at 1pm. 1 hour to see triage, 5 hours later has blood tests done. At 1am I had enough & left without seeing a doctor. Hadnt seen a single person in the waiting room called in since ~6pm.

Went private the next morning. Appointment at 9:30 & on the way home at 12:30. Turned out I'd pneumonia.

I get that they're busy & I wasn't a priority but it's the lack of communication that bothered me. Nobody would talk to you so no idea how long you'd be waiting. There's nothing there except a vending machine. They should be sending home non urgent cases & arranging appointments to come back instead of ignoring them & leaving them sit in a waiting room.

lukas8888

Charge the drunks etc clogging up the public hospitals and make everybody pay something once they enter no exceptions

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197083#Comment_121197083

There was the €100 charge, abolished only in first half of this year, it had been to stop A&E being seen as a handy alternative to the GP. Although convenient it is not when you have to wait at least 7 or 8 hours before going away with a prescription or advice. The advice now is nearly always to return to your GP for follow up after they’ve endured you are not having a heart attack etc.

On my recent visit to A&E I didn’t in this occasion see drunks or likely drug addicts in the waiting area, although it is possible some may have been given a trolley in one of the cubicle spaces where available, to stop them disturbing other patients.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121197038#Comment_121197038

They are always trying to direct people to public minor injury clinics, but very few of those around, apart from the ones set up by health insurance companies. It is not always made clear what these can exactly deal with too. In your case a non urgent clinic (eg that opens 8am - 8pm) would have been able to do the job in the first place. Take history of painful intake breaths (typical pneumonia), raised temperature & xray to see extent of infection. Heart attack can usually be ruled out by symptoms and a simple blood test. A typical pneumonia is treated with a course of prescription antibiotics, if it looks more extensive and there’s other medical issues, it could be then referred on to an A&E for further treatment/evaluation.

We need more clinics to evaluate the more common type of stuff that happens to us and that doesn’t seem appropriate to wait a week for a GP appointment, they could act as triage for filtering out simpler stuff away from hospital EDs, so that the more genuinely complex cases get the hospital consultant attention.

banie01

My younger brother died in July after suffering an intercranial haemorrhage. He collapsed at his home. An ambulance was called immediately and it was 134 minutes before one arrived. He lived within 40 mins of 4 large ambulance bases (5 if we count Air Ambulance road response) and whilst his address is "rural" it is 2km from the N20.

It was 81 minutes before an ambulance was available to despatch to him. That is despite the call being immediately triaged as Code Red by the ambulance call handler.

What should stand out in that delayed response. Is that given the time before an ambulance became free to respond? That it indicates that for at least 81mins, no immediate ambulance coverage was available for a large portion of the N20, West Limerick, north Cork and south Tipp areas.

The delay in offload and handover of patients from Ambulances into A+E is having a huge impact on ambulance availability and response times.

I don't know what the fix is. I know there's a problem. I know it's a multi-factorial one that touches on the resources available to our blue light services and our A+E's. Every single person I've spoken to, has been very open with regards to the problem they face, but they are all very much focusing on their silo/patch rather than a holistic view of addressing the pinch points in handovers and in available resources across the entire patient "journey".

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198341#Comment_121198341

The 100 euro A&E / ED charge has been abolished?

I don't think so.

You may be referring to the 80 euro overnighyt fee, that was abolished a few months ago?

https://www.gov.ie/en/press-release/3f77b-minister-donnelly-welcomes-the-abolition-of-public-hospital-in-patient-charges/#:~:text=Minister%20for%20Health%20Stephen%20Donnelly,abolished%20in%20all%20public%20hospitals.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198341#Comment_121198341

youre mixing up hospital charges for staying those were abolished.

€100 fee for self referral is still in place.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198692#Comment_121198692

I haven’t been charged 🤔

I don’t know why I haven’t been charged for two A&E appearances at SVUH, so I assumed the charge must have been dropped.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198778#Comment_121198778

Do you have a medical card?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198786#Comment_121198786

No

JupiterKid

Good idea recode to start a new grumpy old man rant thread.😁👍

I certainly need to vent today....

From early this morning until this evening, I encountered so many acts of pure rudeness and aggression that I don't honestly know where to start. Manners and decency were not in any evidence today, starting with a minor car collision in my locality on my way into work (not my car) where the two drivers (a man and a woman both in their 40s) got out and hurled vile abuse at each other.

Later on, in my college where I lecture, a disabled student in a wheelchair in my first year module struggled to open the classroom door after my lecture whilst a couple of other students just filed past her until I intervened to help.

And that's just for starters....

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198796#Comment_121198796

Haven’t a clue then! Maybe SVUH just like you a great deal 😎

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198469#Comment_121198469

That was a dreadful thing 🥲 I have observed the ambulance handovers which are ridiculously prolonged. There is usually one single nurse on duty assigned to take the handovers. Ambulance personnel are twiddling their thumbs and exchanging small chat typically for maybe 30 minutes before that one nurse makes a reappearance to take the details and sign over responsibility. There may be 4 ambulances queued up outside.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198817#Comment_121198817

I’ve lately become an excellent customer 😁

https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/health/health-services/gp-and-hospital-services/hospital-charges/#:~:text=If%20you%20attend%20an%20emergency,Medical%20card%20holders

I see my last visit would have been without charge as I was admitted as an in-patient… to the private hospital as per overflow protocol. The second last time was in relation to symptoms arising from the condition (MS) which triggered my initial visit there this year for which I had paid. So all accounted for. Tip - make sure to relate your symptoms back to your original attendance! 😁

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198843#Comment_121198843

”hi I was here last week with a pain in my arm but it’s back now only this time it’s actually a cough”

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198877#Comment_121198877

“The pain is still kind of there but the small nightlife cough I had then has turned into what it is now, the pain seems to have been referred from my lung”

raxy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198397#Comment_121198397

I did got the the VHI before & had x-rays, they are the ones who sent me to A&E. The pain I had was not intake of breaths, I Was paralyzed with the pain. I couldn't move, my entire left side was in pain shooting up into my neck. Since you don't know what my condition was like maybe don't try trivialise it! I wouldn't be calling an ambulance unless I thought it was necessary.

holliehobbie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198341#Comment_121198341

There still is a €100 charge for attending A and E!

holliehobbie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198843#Comment_121198843

I had a series of nose bleeds in March 2020. They wanted to charge me €400! Had to fight to not pay the other 300. As they hadn’t cured me the first time! Eventually paid €250 in a private clinic to have cauterisation which cured me!

holliehobbie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198351#Comment_121198351

You weren’t in St. James’s A n E then!