"Bad care management in trauma and orthopaedics"

After being diagnosed with arthritis of both hips, I was referred to an orthopaedics team at Coventry University Hospital, where I was put on a waiting list for surgery. I waited months for an appointment to come through for my first operation, only to be given a week's notice that I would need to attend hospital for surgery on a Saturday. One the day of the operation, I was put under general anaesthetic but came round to be told that the surgeon was unable to carry out surgery, because I would in fact need open surgery. The surgeon didn't explain why he wasn't able to tell from my scans that I needed open surgery. However, he did tell me that I would have an appointment back at the clinic within 2 weeks and my operation would be carried out within 2 months. A while later, I got a clinic appointment for 2 months' time. I called the hospital and was told that they had no idea I hadn't had my op. As far as they were concerned, I had been operated on and just needed a follow-up appointment. Since then, I have been told that I will now have to wait 35 weeks for my operation, which means I am back at the start of the waiting list. This whole affair seems to me like an attempt to massage waiting list figures by getting people into hospital, ticking them off the list but carrying out no work. It's either that or an appalling failure by staff to communicate about patients in their care and a total disregard for the discomfort of patients.