"Impossible to get hold of Infomation on surgery..."

I came into Medway on Sunday with a broken ankle after x-ray at sittingbourne hospital. I was placed in a room in the SAU and was told that the consultant othopedic surgeon would come and see me, this was at 2pm, at 3:30 a doctor came to see me and said my ankle may need surgery but they couldn’t make that decision and the consultants would see me in the next hour, at 6 o’clock I asked a nurse if they knew if the consultant was coming, reply was “don’t know”. At 7pm I saw the doctor I see earlier and was told I needed to have another x Ray, after x Ray I was brought back to ward and told the consultant still needed to make a decision and I needed to stay in over night so the consultant could make a decision in the morning.

I asked if I could return home and wait their decision over the phone, half hour later I was told that I would need surgery and it would probably be on Thursday and would receive a phone call to confirm, but if I didn’t hear anything then I should contact the consultants secutary. I finally left the hospital at 8:30.

On Tuesday I still had not heard from hospital so contacted the consultants secutary, no answer so message was left, over the next few days I still had not heard from hospital so continued to leave messages with the secutary. Finally on Thursday afternoon the secutary returned my call and was quite rude over the phone and said it wasn’t their job to schedule in dates for surgery and it was the job of the trauma coordenator but the position was currently not filled. When I asked who would be booking in my surgery they said someone might ring me next week maybe.

By Saturday I still haven’t heard anything from hospital and now in quite a lot of pain, I contacted the switch board to be put through to the on call othopedic team. After being on hold for over 30minutes finally was put through to a doctor that said I was in a waiting list but still couldn’t give a date for surgery. Was told hopefully next week but they couldn’t garentee it , so am still waiting.

I understand that the hospital is busy but it isn’t right that a patient should have to keep ringing constantly to try and get any information from them.

Communication between hospital and patient is extremely poor.