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Care Opinion

Long wait for x-ray

Posted By SarahC1976

"Long wait for x-ray"

About: Royal Victoria Hospital / Accident & Emergency

(as a service user),

I took my niece who is at University in Belfast to ED after a fall which resulted in her sustaining an injury to her back. Her parents live in the South of Ireland. We arrived at 2:30 pm. She was triaged quite quickly and was seen within 30 mins. My niece had asked me to go in with her but I was told it was only the patient allowed in. Yet I continued to witness many patients bring a second person in with them (they were not elderly nor challenged about having someone with them). While waiting an hour on my niece coming back out her dad phoned to tell me she had been moved up to level 2 for an x-ray. After waiting a further 30 mins I decided to go to level 2 to check on her.

When I went to x-ray I was redirected to a different waiting area, which I discovered was part of ED. It was packed and people were sitting on floor. After waiting to 8:00 pm with only 2 patients being called for x-ray I asked a radiographer for my niece's x-ray. She sent her to speak with medical staff and told her she would keep an eye out for her form. It was 10:30pm before my niece was seen.

As a nurse working in NHS myself I appreciate that our hospitals are busy. There was a lack of communication that evening. Surely a quicker triage system with someone who is able to request x-rays and review them would allow our waiting areas to be cleared quicker. Minors would be in and out and would also free the staff up to look after sicker patients. It feels like our NHS systems are broken and without better management strategies we as an NHS are never going to survive.

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Responses

Response from Linsey Sheerin, Divisional Nurse, Urgent and Emergency Care, Emergency Care, Belfast Health and Social Care Trust about a year and a half ago
Linsey Sheerin
Divisional Nurse, Urgent and Emergency Care, Emergency Care,
Belfast Health and Social Care Trust

Submitted on 10/11/2022 at 18:31
Published on Care Opinion at 18:31

Dear SarahC 1976,

My name is Linsey Sheerin, I am the Service Manager for Urgent and Emergency Care at Belfast Trust from the outset I wish to apologise for the delay in responding to you. I am saddened to read this poor experience. I am sincerely sorry that when you attended with your niece you were told to wait outside for her. At the time of your attendance regional guidance was that if you attended ED to attend alone, however this is something which could not be fully police by staff.

As you will be aware the pandemic continued to impact the health and social care system, in terms of ongoing cases, increased complexity of patients and significant backlogs of care needs across services. This has had a disruptive knock-on effect on our ambulance service, emergency departments, availability of inpatient beds and access to timely care. However, this is by no means an excuse for your poor experience.

It is with deepest regret that when your niece attended the waiting times were longer than what we would wish them to be. I am sorry that you felt there was no communication and better systems should have been in place. We are continuing to review our services to ensure that patients can access timely urgent and emergency care and that effective communication takes place with every interaction.

Linsey

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