howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
after waking with a toothache this morning and knowing that my dentist does not open on a saturday i rang the n.h.s denaline service.
they took down all my details and told me to report to the fracture surgery reception at 11.10 am at the above.
at 11 am i checked in and a rather disinterested young woman gave me directions where to go without once looking up at me.
i arrived at the maxillo facial unit(great title but they mainly deal with choppers so no problem), the reception was unpersoned and there was a note exhorting people to sit down and be patient. after an hour i was getting a trifle impatient and enquired as to when i would be seen.
it transpired that i was in the wrong place and should be at the dentaline unit next to the reception i had booked in with.
this time there was an older woman that when she realised what had happened was most apologetic and got me seen right away.
meanwhile the doughnut that had misdirected me dissappeared like a shot out of a gun when she clapped on eyes on me, no apology.
i hasten to add the dentist and dental nurse were excellent and patched me up until i can see my own dentist.
it seems to me that evenings and weekends are bad times to use a hospital, no top brass, hardly any doctors to keep things under control.
They still haven't cottoned on that they are service providers, Howard, and that service providers have to provide the service whatever. In business, if you fail to provide a decent service people go elsewhere...........unfortunately the NHS, great as it is and no mistake, has for years protected and hidden the underperformers to the detriment of the business. It has to stop.
Guest 698- Registered: 28 May 2010
- Posts: 8,664
I'm an optimist. But I'm an optimist who takes my raincoat - Harold Wilson
Peter!!!!!!!
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
they had a different department for that peter, i passed it on the way in, a bloke that was a dead spit for john goodwin was creeping out.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
bern
the thought came to me on the way home about the private sector employing ex public sector staff.
there are a small minority in the public sector that are frankly unemployable, every hospital visit i have made in the past 10 years i have seen people that have non jobs.
i will detail some of these later when i gather my memories together.
Most third and private sector orgs won't touch public sector cast-offs with a barge pole. And rightly so.
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
Gosh sorry to hear of your dental woes Howard. I was at Dentaline at K&C a number of times in the latter half of last year..a couple of times very late at night as I remember, also with a visit to a doctor in same hospital there at 3am with same problem, wisdom teeth.. Always got very well looked after even at 3am when I thought the guys on duty would not be interested at all, but they were.
I pondered on the way home in the silent night how awful it would be if services like these were cut.
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
Alas Paul I think a lot will be cut, the computer prats feed information in to their machines to see where greater efficiency can be achieved, trouble is computers can't predict the patient that takes half an hour to check out when it should be 15 minutes.
Some people on here continually criticise the NHS, I was discharged from Kent & Canterbury last week. I can only say that the standard of care I received was excellent, the nursing staff were faultless and the doctors gave me a daily update as to whether I was responding to treatment.
What I did notice was there was only a few nurses running a very busy ward and seemed to work extremely long shifts, under in some cases very difficult circumstances. For example an old gentleman refused to be treated by anybody coloured, saying to one young nurse,"leave me alone, I don't want no effing n....r touching me."
The best thing the crititics of the NHS can do is pay for Private treatment but just don't expect treatment on demand and don't expect to be a patient, you'll be a customer.
Sorry if I rambled a bit and Howard I'm not getting at you but those that think they are better than the professionals. Ramble over.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
dave
the professionals are excellent, the let down i find is some of the out of hours staff and a lot of the computer button pushers.
i have posted on here about the excellent treatment i got from the k & c and also the odd times when it has been dire, i can only speak as i find.
Some seem to think it is unBritish to be crtitical of ths NHS , or maybe that people not nursing hands on cannot be critical of hands on nurses. Both are untrue. And if you think you are a patient and not a customer right now, think again. The times they have a-changed.
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
Fair criticism is fair enough if you know what you're talking about, which by your posting, you do. Bern without getting personal, you complained about the Irish Republics healthcare and now you complain about ours. You will never get the best out of anybody by charging in and making demands about whether this or that has been done, they will ignore you.
I am afraid you tend to be a little too abrasive thereby putting peoples "backs up".
There are 2 sides to every coin, now let's leave it at that.
I never start off abrasive - I have been around too long to do that. The old phrase"You trap more flies with honey than with vinegar" is my watchword. However, when that doesn't work I am happy to change gear. You have never, clearly, experienced the Scutari regime that is Irish healthcare. You are lucky.
Guest 663- Registered: 20 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,136
Yes Howard sorry to hear about your tooth probs, and as PaulB has said many hours were spent at K&C but i have to say that the treatment we had was excellent right through to the final vist to QEQM, in both hospitals the staff were brillant.
So it would be a great shame if any of that was to go.
Just to say that I, too, have just come out of Kent and Canterbury and everyone was most helpful and the ward was really clean. Sad to say I was a complete wooss and cried most of the time but they could not have been kinder. My greatest criticism is that it was really cold, even in recovery they were wearing fleeces! However, they have a new gadget - a blow up duvet - for theatre. It was mega!!
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
It is a very good hospital Diana but you are quite right the emergency wards on the ground floor are very cold, I froze. Apparently the heating is turned off to save money.
Bern I know you go straight in on the offensive and seem full of your p and importance. You probably don't realise it but thats how it comes across.
One of the genuinely nice things to come out of recent blogging and events - apart, of course, from the appalling experience we had which was inexcusable and inhumane - is the opportunity for people to also share their good experiences. It really is by sharing all of the experiences that the services can develop and improve. It matters as much to know what is being done right as it does to know what is being done wrong so that we can do more of the former and less of the latter. What is not helpful is a blanket and blinkered view of nurses as "angels" and the NHS as Sacred. That does not help to improve things where they need it.
Dave - as we have never met or spoken that is an indefensible comment. I had gone through a huge effort of pleases and thank yous and spoken, very politely and kindly, to a great many people in an attempt to get things improved when my Mother was in hospital - it all failed and it was then that I stepped it up a notch.
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
It wasn't your mother in hospital i was referring to, please lets leave it now, i have no desire to fall out with you, least of all on a public forum and if I do ever meet you I'll happily buy you a drink.
And I will happily drink it!! I agree - life's too short!
I'm an optimist. But I'm an optimist who takes my raincoat - Harold Wilson