"No communication - very slow to help with pain"

My wife went for a day surgery. We were quickly seen and the staff were friendly, but we were then just left in a side room. My wife popped out to ask if we should just stay where we were and someone said they would find out. No one came back. I went to ask and was told to find a nurse. I could not find one so went back to the room. My wife then went out again and someone came in and said to me ‘you should not be here, you need to go’. I asked where, and for how long and what was the process for the day. The response was call this number in a few hours. My wife waiting for around 3 hours and

I eventually received a call at around 5pm to say my wife was out of surgery and on SSSU. The team were friendly but unable to tell me if everything went ok. It was clear my wife was not well enough to come home. In the morning I received a call from my wife in tears saying she was in a huge amount of pain and she had been waiting 2 hours for pain relief after asking several times. I went in to pick her up, she was in tears, but had at least been given some pain relief.

The ward apologised for the wait and said they were very busy….. it was half empty. The team were friendly, but poorly managed. There was near to no communication and while it is understood clocks operate at a different speed in the NHS if you are a patient all we want to have is information about what is going to happen. Even a fact sheet would have helped. I should point out that the hospital was very clean.