"Felt care was unsafe"

My partner was rushed to A&E  with sudden onset of severe chest pain, light headed and elevations on an ECG following 2 weeks of feeling faint, breathless and palpitations leaving her unable to function or even leave the house.  Worst experience of a A&E ever and we used to live in London! The system is completely broken.

We were told by paramedics that as she was “stable”, she would be seen quicker by sitting in A&E waiting room and there she was left.  I should add, the paramedic crew were lovely and only following guidelines but “stable” was severe ongoing chest pain and vomiting as she had been given morphine for the pain in the ambulance but was experiencing a negative reaction to it.  So there we sat with her scared and in pain, openly vomiting in the waiting room. She was finally “triaged” in about an hour by a nurse team who simply asked her to repeat what the ambulance team knew and put her back in the waiting room with ongoing pain and vomiting. 2 hours passed before she was given an ECG and bloods were taken.  She was told it may be a 3.5 hour wait to then see a doctor and get results and never checked on again.  

All around us the once empty waiting room continued to fill up.  During our time there the waiting time on the board moved from 3 to 10 hrs and we saw 3 people collapse unobserved with other patients and members of the public (including myself) having to call for assistance to be given to them.  A young person was brought in by police having self harmed with blood dripping down their legs and sat unattended on the floor as no seating was free, clearly having a mental health crisis; 2 other people started fitting, again unobserved.  Another man brought in after being attacked and with a head injury was left alone in a wheelchair until he passed out and we called to get him help.  

In the end it was almost 11 hours from arrival when my wife finally saw a doctor and was given results of the tests taken 6hrs earlier.  During those 11 hrs she was not monitored, checked on, and sat upright in a chair despite severe chest pain, often vomiting. Upon speaking to the doctor it became clear they and the senior dr in charge had not read the ECGs from the ambulance and sat telling her all tests were normal and initially she could just go home. We had to point out the changes and elevations noted in the original ECG, at which point they took them to their senior colleague to examine again and was given another ECG.  The end result was they confirmed she hadn’t had a heart attack, didn’t know what was wrong, offered no explanation for what had happened at all but suggested she could be admitted to a general medical ward if she wanted and staff there might look into things tomorrow...

 At this point it was after midnight (her chest pain had started at 10.45am that morning) and having been very ill for 2 weeks she was now feeling ten times worse. We were initially pleased at least more tests would be done to get to the root cause if she stayed in, and thought at least she could finally lie down and get some much needed rest and care.  However, she was then informed that they didn’t yet have a bed and they were incredibly busy so before she could be admitted she would need to spend an unpredictable amount of time sitting on a chair in the corridor despite still having chest pain, albeit milder.  Upon hearing this she asked to go home.  Only then did they try and offer her a temporary place to lie down to wait but by this point there was nothing I could do to convince her to stay.  So I then took her home in a taxi, still with old chest pain.  

I am now in a state of anxiety realising that if she feels unwell again the above will need to happen all over again before she is seen and one nurse informed us that waiting times reached 17hrs last week.  The lack of staff, the almost non existent care  for those in A&E and the indignity I witnessed makes me absolutely terrified of ever becoming ill and completely helpless to help my partner get to the bottom of what has happened.   I dread her saying her chest pain is more severe but refusing to go back to the hell that’s A&E…and after all that we don’t know why she is suddenly so very unwell.  

I don’t blame staff at all, all were friendly, if clearly very stretched. However this situation is now dangerous - I witnessed one patient who had a previous stroke and was experiencing symptoms and someone else with chest pains as well as a couple with a sick baby all leave due to the increasing waiting times as they could stand it no longer. I feel this is a dangerous, unsustainable situation.