"I discharged myself from Surgical Assessment Unit"

Gp sent me FV SAU as I had fever and some hip/pelvic pain. Abdomen was sore when pressed too. I was in a fair amount of pain and also quite dehydrated. The nurse who did the initial history etc was superb, friendly and professional as were the surgical chaps who saw me quite quickly and arranged a scan. From this point on things went South pretty quickly. 

The dehydration had been commented on but no water or IV fluids were forthcoming, nor was pain relief or even paracetamol for the fever. I apparently had an episode of unresponsiveness during the scan and got back to SAU feeling much worse. At this point I must say the staff who were with me in the scanner after whatever happened were also amazing and did well to comfort me when I was a bit confused. Back at SAU, I kept complaining of dehydration and pain as did my wife on my behalf. Despite repeated promises nothing was forthcoming even though everyone could see I was in distress with my muscles contracting and spasming uncontrollably (Tetany due to deranged electrolytes although I would not be told that out until I was discharging myself much later)

A covid test came back positive despite not having (And still never had) covid symptoms, this lead to me being put in my own room and struggling even more to get some hydration or pain relief.

Eventually I saw a medical doctor who promised to be right back with something to try and sort the tetany/spasms, he seemed unsure as to why this was happening. He never returned, in fact until 2.5 hours later when I went and told a nurse I was discharging myself nobody came to check on me at all. 5 hours in I did get paracetamol and kept refilling the plastic cup with water from the toilet sink to try and hydrate myself, not sure if it was drinking water or not but my guts have not been right since.

After a couple of hours of sipping questionable water my limbs were under control and I decided I would be better at home. It was only when leaving that I found out my electrolytes were all wrong and their was all sorts of IV things they wanted to give me and tests to complete. Quite why they had just left me for hours on end with nothing I don't know but if they cant give a dehydrated chap with a high fever some fluids then I didn't fancy my chances staying in. Each time I was told the fluid/ pain relief/ whatever was imminent or had to be checked with a doctor, each time the hours just ticked by with nothing forthcoming. It was not even too busy initially.

They should never have let the dehydration get to the stage it ended up at and had I gone home instead of to the hospital I would have taken on fluids and pain relief and ended up feeling much better much quicker. My GP told me to take my urine sample with me as it had blood in it, I handed this over immediately yet it was still sat on my table 4 hours later and I don't know if they ever did test it.

The worst of it is that my umbilical hernia is quite sore now (was not too bad at the time) and probably should get looked at sooner rather than later but there is no way I could go back. A shame as the surgeons themselves are exactly the sort of folks I would trust to operate on it.