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My sister's suspected sepsis

Posted By ANON 123

"My sister's suspected sepsis"

About: NHS 24 / NHS 24 (111 service) Scottish Ambulance Service / Ambulance Control Centre Scottish Ambulance Service / Emergency Ambulance University Hospital Monklands / Emergency Department

(as a relative),

MY sister had to be taken to monklands ae department.  I phoned an ambulance informing them that my sister has a terminal illness has a history of sepsis and was running a temp in terrible pain and could not leave her bed.

999 handler told me that my sister who had delirium by then wasn't unwell enough to get an ambulance!!!! They put me on to nhs24 who said I'd to take her to out of hours I informed handler that the couldn't even walk!!

They then said a doctor would make a house call which could be up to a 4 hour wait . As it is well publisied I knew that when you suspect sepsis you must get medical treatment asap and my sister has had numerous sepsis episodes which I told handler about.

Anyway I then put my sister into a car and drove her to monklands hosp where she received wonderful treatment from a nurse called Jordan and ae  Doctor Sean. They were compassionate professional and wonderful to my sister and family thank you so much after what I feel waas horrendous treatment which we received from phoning 999 !!!!!

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Responses

Response from Gavin Dolan, Senior Nurse - Medical Directorate, University Hospital Monklands, NHS Lanarkshire 4 years ago
Gavin Dolan
Senior Nurse - Medical Directorate, University Hospital Monklands,
NHS Lanarkshire

Submitted on 07/05/2019 at 17:38
Published on Care Opinion at 18:32

picture of Gavin Dolan

Hi ANON 123,

Thank you for taking the time to leave feedback on the Care Opinion platform. I am really sorry to hear that your sister was so unwell - you must have got a real fright. Equally I am sorry for the experience you had with the 999 service.....this must have certainly made you both anxious and angry.

I think you did the absolute right thing in getting your sister to us as quickly as you did and your recognition of the life threatening condition, sepsis sounds very well managed. I am really glad also to hear that both Sean and Jordan had such a positive impact on you and your sisters experience. This is what we aim to achieve in person centred care and the fact that you mention that the care was wonderful, will make the guys realise they achieved just that.

I do hope your sister is now making a recovery from her sepsis and wish you both the very best for the future.

Best wishes,

Gav

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Response from Pat O'Meara, General Manager, Events, Scottish Ambulance Service 4 years ago
Pat O'Meara
General Manager, Events,
Scottish Ambulance Service

Head of Events

Submitted on 07/05/2019 at 18:02
Published on Care Opinion at 18:32

Dear Anon123,

I was very sorry to read about your experience when you called 999 for your sister.

We do assess calls when they are received to ensure that the most appropriate response is made and sometimes that can be a referral to NHS 24 and they will then carry out an in depth assessment, but we should get it right every time for the patient and any referral needs to be safe and appropriate.

I would like to look in to how the 999 call that you made was handled by us. If you want to, please contact me on 0141 810 6101 and I will look in to this for you. I am keen to see what we can learn from this and to be able to explain to you and your sister why your call was managed in the way that it was.

Please pass on to your sister my very best wishes and thank you for getting in touch.

Regards,

Pat

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Response from Dawn Orr, Nurse Consultant - Telehealth and Telecare, Nursing and Care, NHS 24 4 years ago
Dawn Orr
Nurse Consultant - Telehealth and Telecare, Nursing and Care,
NHS 24

Submitted on 07/05/2019 at 20:43
Published on Care Opinion on 08/05/2019 at 08:54

picture of Dawn Orr

Dear ANON 123,

I am so sorry to learn that your recent contact with NHS 24 was not of the standard of care you and your sister expected. It sounds an extremely frightening experience, I hope she is recovering well.

I would be keen to explore your contact with NHS 24 further and echo Pat’s comment that we would be keen to learn from your experience. Our Patient Affairs Team can be contacted on 0141 337 4597 or by email at patientaffairs@nhs24.scot.nhs.uk

I look forward to hearing from you. I wish you and your family well.

Regards

Dawn

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Update posted by ANON 123 (a relative)

I will definitely phone you as I'm extremely annoyed at the 999 response. I stated on the call that my sister had terminal cancer, was in extreme pain even tho she had just had morphine, also her nephrostomy tube had become dislodged, that she had a temperature and had several episodes of sepsis in last few weeks.

I also stated that we couldn't move her from her bed due to the pain she was enduring. In this day you don't think that you will have to carry your sister into a car whilst she had delirium and drive her to hospital in such pain.

I even explained to the man on the line that phoning an ambulance was something I didn't do easily and when we got to A&E both the nurse and doctor we saw was horrified that an ambulance hadn't been sent.

My sister is still very unwell in hospital hopefully the doctors and nurses won't fail her like the ambulance service did! Will contact u within next few days as I would not like others to experience this horrible situation.

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