"My poor mother was beside herself with worry all day"

I recently attended Antrim A&E with my elderly mother who is hard of hearing. She had been told to attend by her GP to get an abscess drained which was under her armpit. The GP had provided a letter for the hospital. She went through triage and was signposted to minors.

We sat there for 6 hours without seeing anyone. She was then called and examined by 2 doctors who said yes just needs drained (we knew that already) but that they couldn't do it and would have to page the surgical team!

We went out into the corridor (a crowded corridor) no seating left, people laying on the floor, some vomiting around us, lots of people having to stand with drips attached. We waited a further 2.5 hours before being called up to EMSU.

There she waited a further hour to be seen by a surgeon, who again examined her and said yes it was a simple drain and asked their colleague to do it. They went to get a nurse and by this stage it was handover and they said they had to wait for the nurse to come back. When the nurse came back an hour later, guess what - no doctor and more waiting.

Finally the less than 5 mins procedure was completed and my mum's wound was dressed. I finally thought we were going to get home (we had nothing to eat or drink since the morning) when I was told that we had to wait for another Dr to write her letter for the GP. This came back with a request for antibiotics - they didn't have enough of this particular type to give to my mum so a new letter stating a different medicate had to be written. This took another 2.5hours.

We eventually left the hospital last night after 12 hours! This was completely unacceptable and in my view the whole system is broken. I do not understand why general practice could not perform this minor procedure, and I definitely cannot understand why Dr's in A&E cannot do it. My poor mother was beside herself with worry all day.