"A&E"

After 100's of attempts by myself and my wife to contact our GP on Monday - we gave up, I then contacted Louth Hospital to see a non urgent doctor (I went through a call operator who put me through to reception, she then put me through to the staff nurse, the staff nurse said I would be better off going to Lincoln A&E). Great...

I had been suffering from sickness and diarrhoea for two full days and this was day three, I had not been able to keep any fluids or medication down in that time.

Triage nurse was spot on and I was seen within minutes.

A few hours later the doctor saw me, very nice bloke, obviously frustrating for him that I'm their as he was firing questions quite quickly to get to the route of the problem as fast as possible, which is understandable. However, by this stage I was feeling very rundown, and lethargic. He took bloods and his cannulation was superb.

Next a urine sample, no chance as I haven't been able to go for a wee for about one day, so the doctor said he would sort IV fluids out for me.

A couple of hours later and there's talk me through into the A&E department into a cubicle shared by two of the women which was ok, but I did feel the other women felt slightly uncomfortable about it. As the nurse came over with the IV fluids I asked her if she would get me some paracetamol to go with it as I have not had any medication to help with the fever she also came out with anti sickness which was very helpful. The nurse administered the anti sickness and the IV fluids then went off to get the paracetamol she was very thorough in asking me if I'd had any paracetamol which I thought was brilliant I confirmed that I did not have any paracetamol and she Hooked Up the second line for the intravenous paracetamol. The nurse then told me to get her when the paracetamol had run out this was a problem because there was no way to contact her so as the paracetamol ran out I turned the IV off myself.

A short while later another nurse came along to check on my IV fluids and as they were nearly out she turned it off at the top and gave me a cup of water which was very nice and it was nice to be able to drink it without bringing it back up again. The problem I had was the IV hadn't been clamped off near my arm so the top section started to draw air packing and I had to clamp off near my arm to prevent air going into my vein. The nurse check with the doctor if there was anything else needed and there was not so the cannula was removed and I allowed to go and I felt a lot more human again. With the treatment at A&E that I received I was able to carry on managing myself at home by drinking plenty of fluids and slowly introducing simple foods if I had not had that simple quick intervention I know doubt would have been a lot worse so a big thank you goes out to all the guys at A&E. I should not have had to have got to A&E but I appreciate that there there at the base level to pick up the pieces from the rest of the service. So great job guys keep going!