"aftercare and advice"

having had the procedure for banding of Hemmerhoids at St Richards clinic on 24.2.2014, I have been appalled by the lack of advice following this. The actual procedure which took all of 10 minutes was tolerably painful, but the advice that the bands would fall off after 3 days deceptive, and also not to strain not helpful. Following instruction to take paracetol for any pain I accepted that there would be some pain, but had not considered that I would become severely constipated, in severe pain and unable to pass faeces because of the internal inflamation and the position of the banded veins. Having tolerated this for several days and taking only soup and a little bread, I decided that I would have to only have a liquid diet. At this stage I called the telephone number provided and spoke to a male nurse who was entirely unhelpful and told me to call the hospital again and speak to the doctors secretary. I did this and the secretary spoke with a doctor and called me back saying I had 2 options: 1) to take painkillers 2) go into A&E. Because of the pain I was experiencing I couldnt bear the thought of sitting in A&E for hours, and as it was then Friday afternoon, I decided to take desperate measures and manually excavate the faeces which were lthen like rocks in my bowel. The pain in doing this was excrutiating and I almost passed out each time but the relief was substantial and very necessary. It is now monday 6 days after the procedure and I am still suffering, on a liquid diet and helping myself to relieve the pain- my internal bowel appears to very inflamed and narrow, and , the bands are still intact. I will try and see my doctor today and see if he can recommend something to calm the inflamation and reduce the pain and the constipation. All of this I feel could have been avoided by correct advice about sensible food intake or medication that would have controlled the situation. Also correct band rejection times. The leaflets provided simply indicated that spotting may occur and gave advice to call the department in the event of problems (not useful in my case) also to contact doctor or A&E if substantial bleeding should occur. I regret that in my case the verbal advice given was rather flippant and gave me the wrong impression about the ease of the procedure and healing and aftercare. Perhaps this information will help with staff training, knowledge and advice given on your advice sheets.