"My daughters hospital stay"

My husband called NHS24 in the evening as my daughter has childhood asthma. In the past (4 times) before she has needed to use a nebuliser as if she has been around animals etc the inhaler is not enough.

We usually go to out of hours and are given a nebuliser to take home and use for a few days until she is back to normal this has happened 4 times in 2 years.

On this occasion when my husband arrived at out of hours the on duty doctor had been called out to a patient and he was told to take our daughter to A&E. He also had our other young daughter with him.

I finished work at 10pm and arrived at A&E. The doctor is A&E said he would like to have the paediatrician in Ward 15 look at her as he was unsure if she should be admitted.

We explained to the doctor about the previous times this has happened. She had been given a steriod and nebuliser in A&E and seemed much improved. We were taken to Ward 15 at 11.30pm and told that after the paediatrician looked at her we would be allowed home.

This turned out to be a lie, as before she was even examined in A&E the nurse in Ward 15 informed us she was to stay overnight. When we told her that this was not what we had been told and that we just wanted to be given a nebuliser and take her home she became very rude and told us, "well this is your daughters health we're talking about surely you want the best for her".

After talking to the paediatrican I agreed to stay with her at the ward overnight and be allowed home in the morning. During the night this rude nurse came to take observations every 2 hours and each time she would make a jibe at me like, " surely you can see she's not well" and was extremely abrupt with me.

I had worked a 14 hr shift that day and didnt sleep all night due to the monitor on my daughter which was poorly attached coming loose each time she moved which cause the machine alarm to signal. I had to keep re-attaching it myself as noone came to do it.

By morning I was tired and emotional and wanted to get home. My daughters breathing was greatly improved and her obs were all great. I was then told I might not get to take her home that day at all. But was given no reason why.

I called my husband and as I was in such a state he left work to come to the hospital and told the nurse he wanted to see a doctor and he was taking my daughter home. The nurse turned to him and said "do you not care about your daughters health". We waited 40mins for a doctor and noone arrived so my husband returned to the desk and said if a doctor is not here to see us in 5 mins we are discharging her.

The same nurse came to see us 10 mins later and said the doctor will be another 15mins. My husband said he needed to return to work to which he was told "is your daughters health not worth waiting 15 mins for". We left shortly after.

I'm disgusted by the way we were spoken to and treated as if we were bad parents. This is the reason I left the nursing profession years ago as nurses are meant to be non judgemental. It feels like the nurse I saw at DGRI feels they can say what they like to people.