"Impersonal, faceless, completely & utterly..."

Impersonal, faceless, completely & utterly disorganised. This hospital has learnt nothing from its CQC inspection where outpatients was classed as inadequate. Outpatients is disorganised, inefficient where nothing is anyone’s responsibility. In addition, letters always arrived after the date of the appointment.

I received a serious knee injury after an assault at work in November. A promised urgent outpatient appointment after Urgent Care never arrived; only a text to say an appointment would follow. Literally hours passed while transferred between multiple departments. Persistence resulted in an appointment, but incorrect (shoulder clinic), although referred for urgent physiotherapy, urgent MRI and an appointment with the knee clinic in 2 weeks. I rang to rearrange an MRI date sent for after the knee clinic, leaving a message (someone would get back within 24hrs). My call was returned after 4 days (delayed due to illness), but too late to cancel a privately arranged MRI booked to avoid further delay to my diagnosis. I was still in agony.

A letter arrived saying I had been discharged from physiotherapy as I didn’t live in their area (moved recently to London but hadn’t changed GP due to injury). Physiotherapy provided a telephone number, but no one answers the phone & no facility to leave a message.

PALS was off hand and rude and said there were severe delays throughout and people were suffering and I was no different from everyone else. They suggested I see my GP (Bucks) for physiotherapy, yet I struggled to even leave the house. Of note, it is now 14th March 2017 and I have still not received any NHS physiotherapy.

I was seen by the consultant in the knee clinic for a few minitues, who said I’d need an operation and someone would be in touch within 2-3 days with little explanation of injury, diagnosis, surgery or outcome; indifferent, arrogant, impersonal. I tried to ask for more information but felt a nuisance.

After a few days, my case had been considered at MDT and was asked to come 5 days later for an operation with a different surgeon; who listened, explained, and was kind and caring, taking the time to answer my questions.

I was prepared for the operation that afternoon, but the consultant was irritated to find equipment hadn’t been ordered and I was told to come back the following morning. The next morning, I was prepared for the operation which was later cancelled. The apologetic consultant wanted to avoid passing me to another surgeon, but with an oversubscribed list, my case wasn't urgent enough for that day. At the 3rd attempt, I was finally operated on by the original consultant the following day.

Because of the nature of the assault, I need injury details from my clinician for the Police. Police CID contacted the consultant and team on a number of occasions for details. I have received a life changing, lifelong injury, yet the consultant and team have refused to provide information required for my case. NHS caring at its best