"curates egg"

A&E visit a few months ago for bicycle accident, something of a curates egg.

good: laceration ear sutured carefully, restored anatomy and healed without complications – by no means guaranteed, and I am grateful for the good result.

not good: dislocated sternoclavicular joint treated conservatively i.e. told to live with it, without discussing options.

As I understand it from Dr google, manipulation under anaesthetic will often reduce this dislocation following which there is a roughly 50% chance of it staying reduced…if I had been given this option of possibly avoiding a lifelong weak painful shoulder for the low risk of a brief anaesthetic I would certainly have taken it, at the least I think the decision to do nothing should have been explained.

not very good: cant be sure but witness (camera) evidence was that accident probably caused by losing consciousness first, then crash & bang to head, rather than it being all retrograde amnesia, didn’t get any advice/steer on possible loss of consciousness problem, simply ignored, ? not the immediate problem as I woke up OK, perhaps more holistic service could have done more.

possibly not good: maybe just me being neurotic but I thought dripping water from my ear for a day or so worth checking for CSF, doctors thought CT head ok so no problem, left me feeling my experience wasn’t taken seriously, perhaps they could have reviewed x ray or whatever (me not convinced that x ray always right after previous NGH generated experience of life with a pancake flat necrotic head of femur where I was told the x-ray was normal)…certainly my skull was tender for about three months afterwards, still is slightly, which would be about right for a healing fracture.

farce: being moved between hospitals - went from NGH to hallamshire to get ear stitched, fair enough perhaps though maybe a perfect A&E could do this onsite, then when I complained to physio that "sling" for collar bone injury held together with sellotape(seriously, not a metaphor) would fall apart rapidly I was moved back to NGH so as to get proper sling, physio didn't have safety pin or expertise to make sling without one, evidently plenty of ambulances...