I've just been out to deal with an emergency call from a patient.
Severe abdominal pain. Needs to see a surgeon. I call the nearest surgeon and he agrees to see her. I call an ambulance.
"Can't take her there doc" they tell me. "Too far. We're the only ambulance on for this area after midnight, so there will be no cover if we go."
They want to take her to the local hospital. But it's been downgraded and only has a GP on duty. Not much use, I point out, when you need to see a surgeon.
They head off to see if they can arrange to meet another ambulance en route and swap the patient over. At night. In a lay by.
The good news, they told me, is that there are more cuts in ambulance numbers in the neighboring areas on the way, so the problem is set to get worse.
So when Tony Blair said that 'closing hospitals saves lives', he was either being inappropriately ironic or a Big Fucking Liar.
Like Crippen, I hoped New Labour would save the NHS. Now I hate them.
Lies, corruption, and deceit.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
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32 comments:
Just don't start me. It is almost impossible to book an ambulance in our area. My poor staff ften have to leave the phone ringing for hours until they are cut off and have to try again. we have been told they don't have enough staff and there are no plans to incresae their numbers.
I arranged an emegency admission last Friday and they took 8 hours to arrive.
The poiliticians lie and lie. It is like Soviet Russia with Pravda telling everyone that it is a record harvest and the peasants are starving in the fields. How long can this destruction of the NHS go on.
Our hospital is likely to be downgraded - patients can be treated in alternative settings say the PCT. They also say (using that blurry crystal ball again) that emergency admissisions will fall this financial year by 14%. (They said tis last year and admissions went up. We're halfway through the year, beds have been closed, length of stay has been reduced.....number of admissions sent in is exactly the same...bed crisis worsens. Where will my elderly patients go? They will choose to die at home rather than go a long way to another hospital. That's informed choice for you
The government should put someone in overall charge to sort this nonsense out.
Everyone thought that Labour would do a good job in 1997 but they have failed at everything, either that or they are deliberately trying to fuck this country up.
I think you were all being naive. Thatcher saved the NHS for most of another generation simply by saving the economy from its 70s death spiral. What was then needed was probably a mixture of profound reform, decentralisation and modest competence. What on earth made you think that New Labour could deliver any one of those, never mind all three?
Why are you asking us doctors?
All we know about is 'med', and that's a cakewalk comparing to 'math and economics'.
Dr Informed
of course closing hospitals saves lives---political lives
this government has often been criticised for invading Iraq and Afghanistan and not Zimbabwe; one must not forget that this government is using Mugabe as a mentor and does not wish tto destrot him while he is still generating ideas Nulabour can use to control their non-voters
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