Posted this as a reply to another post, but thought it warranted wider exposure.
I’m in NI, and my NHS care has been first class, I could never have asked for better treatment. Have had treatment at the Royal Victoria, Lagan Valley and Mater hospitals and they’ve been excellent. My heart nurse is a gem, and my cardiologist superb. I hate to read derogatory statements about NHS care, it is so insulting to the overworked and caring staff. Sure, there may be the occasional blip, but that’s true of every service and doesn’t warrant the exaggerated and over the top emphasis on what are usually minor incidents. Some complainers must lead perfect lives, they never make a mistake or depart from their high standards. They should go for treatment in the Yemen or Sudan, they would find out where they’re well off. Be thankful for what we have.
I think that is a statement that warrants a reply. It is certainly my experience that most of the care I have received in recent years under the NHS has been very good. However some has not, and on one occasion I had reasonable grounds to make a formal complaint and did so. And that excludes the significant deterioration in the service offered by my GP practice since the pandemic, and my poor experiences with 111. So in my view the NHS performs adequately overall, in some areas excellently, and if that is the case I will say that where appropriate, but the NHS is not beyond reproach and if criticism is fair and valid I will say so , and hopefully if directed to the NHS itself it might be noted and something done about it.
Well said! I needed urgent treatment recently and got it immediately I was taken by ambulance into A&E and I couldn’t have wished for better care from my cardiologist and all the nursing staff.
Hello, thank you for posting this. I think like many organisations some are better than others. I too had fabulous experience with my Cardiac surgeon, he will forever remain my hero, and his incredible team. However, the hospital I was at before being transferred for my surgery was atrocious. To the point where my partner complained to the head of the Trust and also to the local MP. One of the consultants was abusive not only to myself but another patient. This particular hospital has been in the national news due to some appalling practices. I recognise that all organisations have their issues, be it with individuals, due to ineffective leadership or the wider issue of culture. I believe in being sincerely grateful for the care I was given and would be the first to acknowledge the pressure that some people are under. I think there needs to be a balanced view where improvements need to be made, and importantly needs to be recognised and where necessary reported.
Hi Stillvertical, I also live in NI and was admitted to the Royal Victoria last year in January with a HA and had to stay in for five weeks waiting for a triple bypass which was cancelled the night before planned ops three times. Once I got into the 'cardiac stream' of specialists my treatment was second to none. The surgeon who performed my operation was a locum, as was the cardiologist who assisted him with my op, and they were both EXTREMELY attentive, empathic and understanding both pre-op and afterwards. I was admitted to Antrim Hospital in October and, again, the cardiologist there was superb - the admitting doctor not so good. I also attended the Mater for a day procedure and they were great. Unfortunately the cardiac re-hab I had at Whiteabbey Hospital led my GP to make a formal complaint. I am extremely thankful to all of them for saving my life and giving me back my fitness. I'm grateful that we have the NHS and appreciate that they're under a great deal of pressure, but like all large organisations there are good and bad. Just my thoughts.
I'm so very very glad that you've had good care, but may I ask you to please not assume that everyone has had the same great care experiences and may I ask that you don't automatically decide that they are exaggerating when they complain. It is very very unfortunate that the NHS services available in the UK including waiting lists for appointments and any type of health treatment is very "marmite" ... you are either lucky and love it, or unlucky and hate it.
Believe me I'm very grateful for the NHS we have, and I'm very grateful that it has kept several friends and parents and in-laws and aunts and uncles alive for longer than they might otherwise have been but I'm also very aware of how frequently it has sometimes failed those same patients and others and their families by inadequate care too.
It's completely marmite ... I've just left Mum in a ward where the Nurses are doing a fantastic job but the Doctors aren't spending more than 2mins by a bedside to observe their patients and won't actually listen to or believe what family are saying is wrong when the patient can no longer speak for themselves.
I would agree with your post, 1234_6, and I hope your Mum gets the right treatment, it's really worrying when they're ill, especially when they can't speak for themselves. Carol
Stillvertical51 hi it is great to hear that you have had great nhs treatment. However those of us who have not are not complainers, but simply not fortunate to have had good or even reasonable care. I am a nurse and have been for almost 40 years. I have a some very limited good care, but mostly( and I have a significant range of health issues) have had poor care. At times very poor and sadly on one occasion negligent. We 'complainers' don't lead perfect lives. But personally I will always treat others as I wish to be treated, yes I make mistakes. I felt somewhat patronised by your message, I am sure you didn't intend this. It is good that you have reason to be thankful, personally I don't.
I too am a Nurse of 40 years and have witnessed good and bad from the inside and as a patient. That is why it is so important to thank the good, but complain about the bad. Sometimes it means lesson are learnt.
as Esentepe says, I am pleased that you have had a good experience of NHS care but your experience may not be the one that others have. I have had both excellent and very poor care from the NHS. I have experienced very inappropriate behaviour by NHS staff and also practices which had the potential to cause harm to patients. I reported this not as a way of venting my anger but to try and raise genuine concerns about patient safety. Hopefully in doing so, I helped others. These were not “minor incidents” but part of a pattern of very poor behaviour demonstrated by staff on a surgical ward. 2 weeks after my discharge from hospital it was reported on both local and National tv which indicates the extent of the problems. Unfortunately, while the NHS does some amazing work, it also has the capacity to let people down very badly and I don’t think any institution should be beyond reproach. I found your post to be insensitive towards people who have had the misfortune to experience poor NHS care. Not all of us are as lucky with their care as you appear to have been.
I'm sure the people who have had bad experiences with the health service are thankful really but it doesn't mean that they have no right to complain if they have been let down badly.
Sorry, but you can't assume that because you've had good care everyone else has too. It varies hugely from area to area.Where I live it is particularly poor, and has been on national news.
I don't know if you have PALS in NI, but they're the organisation you go to if you have problems with your care. When they advise you to contact your MP you have to accept it's pretty bad.
Hi I have been attending the only transplant hospital in Scotland for the last six years and the treatment I have received is second to none the staff are fantastic and I am so grateful to them all, but unfortunately the big general hospital near me is awful in so many ways, the building is falling down the staff are overworked and a lot of them just don't care anymore I have seen first hand the way they have treated elderly patients it was awful and I didn't get great treatment myself, the thought of being admitted again is frightening and as for GP's the practice I had been with for over 50 years refused to prescribe my imunosuppressants after my transplant. I think everyone has the right to be treated correctly and with dignity and if not they have the right to complain about it. If no one did then nothing would change. Char
I do not think you are fair in making such sweeping statements about people who complain about the NHS. Although from my own experience the standard of care can be variable from excellent to poor, some people are having to pay privately to see consultants on what are sometimes urgent health conditions, which are certainly not minor nor turned out to be such. Be grateful that you were looked after so well. Also not moaning but the NHS is not free a lot of people have paid taxes and NIC all their lives and the better your income the more you pay so if you do become ill and cannot work anymore you cannot afford to pay private.
We have an excellent Hospital Trust in North Hampshire. My husband and I have received amazing treatment during the last year…. #Heart attack & #a cancer diagnosis both of which came as a huge shock as we considered ourselves to be healthy, albeit elderly. We have been treated with the utmost skill & compassion.
I can’t help feeling the NHS is overwhelmed. It has grown enormously from the days of its inception to a time when the population is ageing & the general health of the nation is in a sorry state (for which a lot of the blame can be laid at the feet of the industrialised food industry, I feel)
We have come to a point when we think there is a panacea for every ill… there are so many treatments that were not available even 10 years ago and we have huge expectations … this is putting immense pressure on the NHS staff … and the GPs are on the front line. I feel gratitude & understanding is called for… even with the strictest protocols mistakes can happen…we all make mistakes it’s just our mistakes are not so visible.
Complaints have their place but only if in the spirit of hoping the situation does not arise again. Bitterness, whingeing and rancour do not have a place.
I too feel an enormous blessing to be living in the U.K. . 🙏
Good morningI would certainly agree with you about treatments I have received at the RVH and LVH - can't comment on the Mater. My AVR was at the end of 2018 but I have noticed a steady decline since that dreaded time we all went through. I still feel thankful we have the NHS. Good luck all x
I too had first class treatment within NHS. The whole heart team and general nurses and doctors at Darent Valley in Kent were amazing, professional and caring. I had just one stent and was told it would have cost 8k privately. I was so grateful I entered a team of crazy family and friends into the London to Brighton bike ride just nine months after my surgery. And I managed to cycle all the way, even up Ditchling Beacon. Im 65 so to say I feel lucky is an understatement. We raised the 8k and it was paid back into the Heart Centre. I think the NHS may be mis-managed but generally, I think, the staff are there because they care ❤️
Tbh, you’re insulting those patients who have received sub-standard treatment. What you’re saying is we should be totally uncritical and grateful, however we’re treated, because we aren’t in a developing country. I don’t think so. We pay for the NHS through our taxes.
As an emergency after a massive HA I was well looked after at the Royal and thereafter in the CCU at the Ulster. The cardiologists at the Royal are world class.
However, my GP was and is hopeless. I have a family history of heart problems going back at least two generations. I’ve been on heart medication for 20 years. When I asked my GP to refer me to a cardiologist he just said there was no point - if I did have a HA I’d be well looked after. This was what happened. But why no preventive action from my GP.
I’ve not seen my GP since before lockdown and only had one telephone consultation with my cardiologist since my HA in February 2020.
The heart failure team at the Ulster have been average to good. My last HF nurse at the Ulster was quite rude and only talked didn’t listen. When I tried to engage with her about using my Apple Watch and a Withings scale to monitor my heart and cardio fitness she cut me off, drew a circle around her face with her forefinger and said, “Can you see my sceptical face.” End of conversation.
After my latest change to meds (by the HF nurse) it took ten phone calls, visits to the surgery and letters to the GP to get the prescriptions right. One of the new meds was twice a day instead of once and I couldn’t get them to double the number of tablets. Very simple.
Even if we’ve not been as lucky as you we’re entitled to recount our experiences as we see it. It’s not how hard people work, it’s the outcomes that matter.
Here in the US, our health care has not been completely socialized and there is still a component of free market working. For example, while the healthcare insurance industry is highly regulated, it still has a good deal of competition in it. You can see evidence of that in their television commercials.
As has happened everywhere, the pandemic has caused a huge wave of pent-up demand, and services have been stretched. Wait times for doctors' appointments have generally increased. Yet, there are signs that this demand wave is being satisfied.
As with any service industry, a free market model will encourage that supply will be increased as demand grows. In this case, supply is the influx of young doctors and nurses who want to make healthcare a career. Many are dedicated for altruistic reasons, but they have families too and deserve pay commensurate with their skills...i.e. as in what a free market will bear. A socialist system inevitably runs out of resources because it does not provide that incentive, or is limited.
The free market model is also better at driving new healthcare technologogy and innovation.
We have many socialists here in the US and they have attempted to completely socialize our system. They even labeled it after a foremost socialist President as "Obamacare". Most people don't depend on it and it hasn't really done what it was intended to do, thankfully.
I regard the doctors who have cared for me as Knights in armor and the nurses as Angels. I'm sure they are in your system as well. It's just that Government cannot plan our lives for us nor become our life long nanny, especially in a complex market, as healthcare is.
All I can say is my local hospital have given me superb care but in January nearly killed me. The heart team were exemplary but a bout of flu had me in a general ward at a time of short staff, high admissions and strikes which led to me being 'overlooked' it's taken me 5 months to recover.
I had very high standards when in my post of 37years in the NHS. I would have done my job for nothing it was a joy. I started in Cardio Thoracic Surgery and moved onwards and upwards, thoroughly enjoying every challenge that came my way.I think dear you are missing the point that myself and other users of the NHS have made comments on. We are not decrying the NHS current and past governments have systematically destroyed it, we are just voicing out experiences and as we still live thankfully in a country where freedom of speech is allowed I really take umbridge to your response.
I don't think that complaints can be called "exaggerated" when medical professionals in various specialisms have been left shocked and speechless when my partner has recounted his experiences of recent years. On several occasions he has been told he has grounds to sue the NHS over some of them, but at the time, like so many people in similar circumstances are, he was not in the right frame of mind to do so. Yes, we have seen some wonderful, knowledgeable and caring individuals over the years, but, for us, the bad now outweighs the good. Be thankful, yes, if you have actually received good treatment. For those of us who have been wrongly treated or simply dangerously ignored, we have the right to complain. My partner is now left to his own devices, with virtually no medical back-up, for most of his conditions. Many we know are having to pay for private tests, scans and treatment, borrowing funds they can ill-afford to repay. I am both affronted and insulted to be described, as I have seen on this thread, as a whingeing complainer. Just be thankful if all your treatment has been compassionate and appropriate, but please do not judge those who have just cause to complain.
Thankfully someone who agrees with me.Sorry to hear of what your partner had been through its not nice, I don't see anybody as a whingeing complainer either and as I said we are all entitled to out opinion good and bad.
Sadly it's not always the case. When I Had a heart attack 5 years gao my treatment was second to none but 3 weeks ago when I was rushed in with a very bad arrhythmia it was appalling; 5 hours waiting for an ambulance, another 3 hours before I had an ECG and blood test; 18 hours in all before I even saw a doctor then another 7 hours before a bed was found. Onthe ward I was never given my pain relief for spinal problems on time; often an hour late when it had already worn off 2 hours earlier. A&E was dangerously out of control with 200 people waiting on trolleys or chairs. on the corridors.
Qualipop.This is not related but I am interested in the fact that you take pain relief for spinal problems. I had a bad fall at the end of March which resulted in a broken hip. When I fell, I fell onto my back and I am still in agony. My doctor has given me Tramadol which does nothing at all. May I ask for your help please, could you tell me the name of your medication so I can have a word with my doctor? ( Actually by” have a word “ I mean filling in yet another E-consult )Thank you in advance.
I've had spinal problems for 30 years and have gone through absolutely everything from paracetamol through codeine, tramadol, oramorph and now oxycodone. Both oramorph and oxycodone are opiates and should only be taken for short periods as they are very addictive and have , if taken long term, very nasty side effects I was allergic to oramorph after the hospital prescribed it but it did work and I have a friend right now who was given it after a bad fall when she fractured her spine. (The hospital phoned her 2 days later because they'd missed seeing the fracture at first) Tramadol didn't work for her at all. She's now having to come off the oramorph very very slowly as her injury improves. I'm now at the stage where my oxycodone has stopped working as my body's become used to it and there's nothing else the pain clinic can offer me except CBD ( cannabis) but not enough is known yet about its effect on the heart.
Thank you so much for your detailed reply. I too have had spinal problems for many years but this latest fall and subsequent surgery has exacerbated my problems considerably. Definitely time to try to see my GP which is much easier said than done. I have never been prescribed the opiates you mention, I was given codeine in the hospital but that’s about all. More investigation required I think. Thanks again.
Good luck. Since the pain is continuing it may be worth asking fort he x ray to be checked a gain in case something was missed. Amitriptylene is also often prescribed for pain. It's a very low dose of an antidepressant that has been found to help with nerve pain. I can't take it but it does work for some. Gabapentin or Lyrica are also usually given for nerve pain.
I was taking Lyrica before this recent accident and to some extent it was working. However I had X-rays a couple of weeks ago and they found two stress fractures. I can only walk a short distance before the pain sets in so I definitely need help to see me through this stage.
At least you are aware it will be short term. YOu GP may be more helpful if he realises that. Opiates have been now made out to be the most evil thing on earth and the cause of many deaths from addiction but that simply isn't the case when taken for severe pain. Everyone I know would stop taking them tomorrow if there was any alternative. Mine's supposed to be every 3 hours but on the rare occasions I have a good day I can easily forget a dose. Other days I'm clock watching but it's now slowed my digestive system right down so I'm struggling with that. It does not cause problems short term. You need help just while the fractures heal so that you can keep moving and keeping your core muscles strong.
Personaly I think Yemen and Sudan would be better than the NHS. I've been misdiagnosed with gastritis whilst having a torn rectus abdominis, 3 years before seeing a specialist to diagnose that. Spent 2 days in an NHS hospital after a heart attack, 2 days of not sleeping because I was pressing the bell for the poor chap across from me having convulsions whilst no nurse in the ward. Served food with a very dirty fork. Sent home from A&E twice with an iv still in my arm and twice with low blood pressure, didn't know where I was. Many of us don't share your veiws on the NHS.
Hi. I have to say that when i had my heart attack 2 years ago i was taken by ambulance to the Royal and rushed through for a stent which undoubtibly saved my life with 100% blockage to the LAD. Was then transferred to Antrim cardiac care where again i received the best of care. Once sent home from hospital it all went downhill from there. Cardiac rehab was one face to face meeting and a few phonecalls as we were still in the midst of the thing that cant be mentioned. One phonecall from consultant 5 months later and discharged.Have since been to A+E countless times and even admitted to Antrim again. Had an angiogram few months ago but main arteries were clear so bye bye enjoy.....gp was not amused that i had received no follow up as obviously something is still causing the angina and erratic heart rate. So she has referred me for holter monitor and stress test.
In conclusion i think the nhs is fab in an emergency but due to cutbacks/viruses etc etc the follow up isnt always great.x
Thoroughly agree my husband and I have usually always received brilliant emergency care with the NHS and are very grateful for it however if you do have ongoing chronic health conditions, which need to be medically managed not just by life style changes, it can be a bit of a nightmare getting help. Also the waiting lists to see consultants can be very long during which time your condition may deteriorate.
Yes they are great for emergency things but not for non urgent things!
A shame you've gone Stillvertical51.
Anyway, in my experience the NHS has provided me with a first class service for a very long-time. I've never had any real issues getting Cardiology appointments, treatment has been good overall, albeit, with the odd hiccup along the way, but, I can live with that.
Five admissions to hospital since April 2022 alone, and no complaints.
Think that those who get treatment are always thankful for it and not to take anything away from all those dedicated people working in the NHS but let's not lose sight of the over 7 million people waiting for treatment. Somethings not working.
I'm greatful.for the NHS saving my life and I will never forget that. They do however need to communicate with each other much better. I'm forever back and forth chasing things that I shouldn't be. It can become stressful.
I'm sorry to see that the person who originally posted appears to have left the forum.
I'm sure that no-one replying (my-self included) were aiming for that to occur.
It was actually nice to see the subject being discussed without any bullying occurring, and to see that people are indeed very grateful for the NHS where and when they get good care - despite issues often occurring in the system.
Please take care everyone and look after yourselves as much as possible.
Treatment is good once you get past the waiting list for scans, my son has been having chest pain looks like heart problems run in my family, but he has to wait 11 months for a scan, so we have offered to pay is a ridiculous time to wait when you are getting chest pains and swelling up in the belly and legs even his fingers looks serious to me I used to work as a carer and have seen this happen
Yes the NHS is good when you eventually get to be seen and the waiting can be a long time so it can get to the fact your condition worsens as it did with my husband and we paid to see a consultant privately in the August who then proceeded on with my husband on the NHS in a different health board to where we lived. By the time he got called in for his angiogram it was November by which time it was urgent so much so they took him into hospital and wanted to transfer him from the hospital he was taken to, to the hospital where they were doing his angiogram which was a different health board and had to put him on blood thinners, whilst waiting for the procedure. They found he had 99% stenosis and needed re- stenting.
I do hope that you can manage to raise the funds & get him scanned eariler and that the results enable him to be triarged further up the waiting list so he is seen eariler. In the meantime if his pains increase then please do visit A&E. I wish him all the best.
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Confused! Please, please help!!! 
Waiting 3 months for any answers of anybody about what happened (when I was blue lighted twice)and 7weeks for a cardiac CT scan Results 
Underhand Tactics
