"Awful “care” while on the Majors ward"

I was taken in to the RUH by ambulance due to severe chest pains and heart palpitations, thought to be brought on by anxiety. However, when I was moved to from A&E to ‘Majors’ for further monitoring and further “care”, that’s when I slowly started to feel I was no longer really being cared for and that they in fact couldn’t wait to get me gone free up the bed I was on.

I arrived on Majors at around 1am, and was told by the nurse that it would be likely I would be discharged in the morning after over-night monitoring. However, just 2 hours later a nurse or doctor came and woke me and said I was “good to go home now”. Confused and thinking it was now morning, I asked her what the time was and she said “3am.. so you can get yourself dressed and get yourself a way of getting home now.” I started to get upset and explained my family lived over 2 hours away from the hospital, my partner was at home with our baby, and that I had no way of getting home at this crazy hour of the night plus I had no house keys on me for my house - all of this mainly because I had been told I would be in hospital for the whole night. The lady then left me to explain my circumstances to the Matron and came back minutes later to say that I could “stay where I was for 30 minutes maximum, and that I could get a taxi home and go via a cash point.” What actually made me laugh though was she also said to me that the ward was “surprisingly quiet” for a Friday night, and I know for sure I was not taking up the last bed because I could see several from where I was laying!

It was the middle of the night, I was exhausted, a few hours earlier had severe heart palpitations, chest pains, which were all thought to be brought on by anxiety, and this nurse/doctor and the matron both happily threw me out in the middle of the night all by myself in the pouring rain to get a taxi to my home 35 minutes away with a man I’ve never met baring in mind I’m a young female who would never get a taxi anywhere on my own at that time of the night even after a night out - let alone minutes after being in hospital and still feeling a bit delirious. Did wonders for my anxiety that did!

I didn’t expect a hotel service but I did expect to feel looked after until morning time and sent home when I actually felt better and a bit more rested - and considering that the NHS is something I pay for as a working tax payer I feel this kind of treatment was really cruel and was almost just asking for me to get a repeat of the ‘attack’ that brought me in there in the first place! This was my first experience ever being admitted to hospital and the staff couldn’t get rid of me quick enough - the loudmouth drunks on the same ward as me weren’t treated as bad as me and took up lots more beds than I did!