[lettie]

I can confirm loads of things brought up in this thread. First of all, Margaret P is right about going through the proper procedure for complaints. Many patients use the PALS servce for their complaints, but by far the most effective way is to write a letter to the manager of the service you have used, Surgical, Medical, Maternity etc. These letters are acted on immediately.

The procedure for discharging patients is always a bugbear. the pressure on beds is immense, especially medical beds at this time of year, hence the dreaded departure lounge. External pharmacy staff are now providing an outpatient service to try and relieve the in house pharmacy staff so that discharge meds can be done quicker. Unfortunately, the ambulance waiting time is out of the hospital's control. Ambulances are run by a completely different service and have to prioritise emergencies.

Sadly for the ambulance service, they have to deal with a lot of timewasters who use them as a free taxi and here are some examples.
1). I had 3 patients brought in to my department by ambulance last night, 2 of whom had cars but their husbands couldn't be arsed to get the car out. All 3 were sent home within the hour because there was nowt wrong with them. I know that people are whining about the weather but I got up early off the night shift yesterday in order to dig my car out and get back to work, many of my colleagues walked to work so that we could keep the service running. If I can dig out and get there from Accy, I don't see why the patient's partners can't get them there from Blackburn.
2). On Boxing Day, a man rang for an ambulance because he had a new computer which he had been playing with for several hours and it had given him a headache!!!!!!!! There was ****** all wrong with him that a couple of Paracetamol wouldn't cure.......
This is the idiocy that the ambulance service are up against, no bloody wonder they are unable to handle patient discharges in a timely manner.

I have to agree that there are too many chiefs and not enough Indians in the NHS. For every new change that the government bring with the NHS, they put in a new tier of management to deal with it. This is not the fault of the frontline staff but the fault of central government.

Love it or hate it, the NHS is here for a reason and for the vast majority of people it does a bloody good job. Many people on this forum, including myself, would not be alive without it. It is never going to be a perfect service, but no service which provides for the total population is ever going to be. However, we are lucky in this country, if we don't like the services provided by the NHS, we have the choice to go private. By the way.........they make mistakes in the private sector too.