"Appointment service"

I was referred by my GP to a particular Consultant's team during the summer. I'm assuming this is the Orthopaedics dept as my GP suspects I may have carpal tunnel syndrome.I duly received a letter from the hospital asking me to arrange an appt via the online booking service which I did. I then got another letter dated 9th August cancelling that appt and was told I would be sent another letter with a new appt. I have received nothing and I check and open my post every day. I have no problems with the mail where I live and have always reliably received information from a variety of different sources including my GP surgery. I left it for awhile,assuming that because we are always told the NHS is overstretched, it meant I was on some waiting list.Rang the outpatients service this morning and spent 45 minutes in the queue only to be told my case was marked as DNA and I had been discharged. As I was not happy with this, the call handler gave me another number to ring, and again I was starting from 33rd in the queue! I did not have the time or the energy to wait for a further 45mins in queue - nor can I afford the cost of another lengthy wait only to be fobbed off again. So I rang my GP surgery and requested a re-referral along with an explanation. I have to wait until next Tuesday when my GP is back in work. Now I have to go through the whole system again through no fault of my own.

I simply don't believe that Salford Royal sent me any letters whatsoever. I was told I had been sent a new appointment letter, and then another letter when I DNA the appt that I didn't know I'd had! It beggars belief that I failed to receive 2 letters and the fault is most definitely not mine. I find hospitals a stressful experience at the best of times, this has just made it a lot worse.