"My partner broke his ankle whilst a little..."

My partner broke his ankle whilst a little worse for where on NYE - stupid we know! It took 3 calls to 999 to finally get an ambulance out, he was on the pavement in the wet for 2 hours on a very cold wet.

Got to A&E around 3am, seems a very grubby and old part of the hospital, we were in assessment room with another guy who was wired up to monitors, nobody came in for maybe 4 hours, I couldn't get help from nurses so pain relief wasn't offered to either patient for this whole time, I had to beg a plastic cup from a Nurse and all 3 of use shared it to get a drink from the tap. I had to help the other patient as he kept needing to urinate and there was only me willing to help him - it really was grim! It was 11.41pm the next day when my partner was officially admitted to ESCU, even there the ward staff had little time for anyone and pain relief had to be asked for by him a number of times while he waited for a slot for surgery.

What was also horrendous was that we live 1.5 hours from Manchester and as his mobile was flat myself and his mother was reliant on the ward phone number we were given, the phone often went unanswered only got picked up when someone went to dial out which would indicate the ringer was turned off, on top of that was the quibbling that he should be using patientline! the guy is laid up with a smashed ankle, I am 1.5 hours away and can't just pop to visit and he has no money with him - £5 for 3 hours is too unaffordable anyway, he was in 3 days so you are talking on nigh on £200!

This hospital is understaffed and overstretched, it needs serious investment! He never saw a doctor once on the ward everything done via nurses and now 2 days after discharge and after leaving repeated messages the orthopaedic secretary just will not answer or phone back to tell him who he needs to contact at our local hospital for his follow up care! Why was this not arranged for him? what about elderly confused patients etc? This hospital is grim!