"Accident & Emergency department at Airedale General Hospital"

Having waited for over three hours for my 6 year old daughter to be examined by a doctor for a head injury and being told that we had to wait a further hour before she could be seen. My daughter became very upset as it was approaching midnight. I informed staff that I was taking my daughter home, as clearly in their eyes she was fit and well, only to be told that I could not take her home nor could my GP examine her the following day, with it being a child and a head injury. From admission and during the waiting time my daughter's injury was not examined nor was she offered any pain relief or any member of staff coming to see if her condition was ok or if it had deteriorated. What I fail to understand is that despite the Government pumping millions of pounds into the NHS, the service delivery remains very poor.

I questioned the role of the Triage Nurse, surely he/she is able to advise parents following an examination of the injury (if and when they carry out examinations) as the best cause of action, ie, whether to wait or to go home with appropriate information.

Patients should be given a choice and this should be explained clearly, instead of making people wait for three to four hours. There were other parents in a similar situation to myself and they too felt angry and frustrated. Frankly, the service and care provided to patients is disgraceful. From what I saw the Staff were busy doing nothing, chatting and loitering around. In my opinion the whole system is poorly managed and run.