"Once bitten - twice shy"

On the advice of 111 I was to take my 3 yr to the a&E walk in following a squirrel bite.

“Don’t worry I’ve booked you an appointment at 4pm so no waiting”

At 7pm I walked out with nothing except a grumpy 3year old that need feeding and the fact she lasted that long was amazing.

ADVICE: wait for a GP. pack for 4 hours, remortgage your house for the car parking or go by bus, expect zero communication other than “your next”. Find out if you are seeing a nurse or doctor it determines how serious they think your case is. Play the following game: patient goes in and is out in 10 mins they predict how long until the next patient goes in - my experience is 20 mins. That’s 2 patients an hour. Avoid 5/6pm it’s dinner time according to the nurses. Whilst your walking write an email to the NhS about your findings and suggest a ticketing or communication system. Take antibacterial wipes - the waiting Hall doesn’t get much love.

The Nhs support staff are amazing but it beggars belief that no one wants or feels empowered to improve the ‘system’ . Some performance management or incentives based on number of patients per hour would be an interesting experiment.

I’ve had the pleasure of pure A&E and i couldn’t be more complementary.