Five years is a long time to be ill. The Other Half (TOH) has been in and out of hospital druing these long years, with no real progress being made. Long journeys up the motorway to hospital have become almost automatic and I no longer have to think about where I am going. I drive, we arrive, I drive and we arrive. It does give me time for thought, occasionally time for chat depending on how the TOH is feeling. On the other hand, it can be pretty boring.
The last couple of visits have been to a fairly new part of the hospital which at least appears to be clean but whilst it may be clean it can be pretty ineficient. For example, last time we were there, we were waiting to be ‘signed out’, we saw the surgeon who carried out the procedure who described what he had done and how well it went etc etc, he then disappeared and another doctor arrived to re-explain what the surgeon had just explained, though we didn’t ask him to but asked him if he could organise the release so we could home. We had afterall waited all day for the surgeon to visit and check on the patient and he had said he could go home. After him another person arrived, a registrar I think and although we had told the one before that we had been told we could go, he still insisted on checking everything over agian. Finally he came back with the paperwork, agreed about a follow up appointment and passed the paperwork on to the nurses at the reception. This process took all day and half the evening. We were at the point where we were just going to leave without the ‘sign off’ when the nurse came and said we could go.
Told the follow up appointment would be sent in the post, it nevertheless, despite going through at least three people, didn’t arrive. Eventaully I rang up and without acknowledging that they hadn’t sent an appointment, managed to make it seem as if we had failed to turn up for the appointment that wasn’t made in the fist place, and I was told firmly that if we didn’t turn up for the next one, we would be struck off the list. At this point I felt I lived in Topsy Turvy land.
During the previous visit, there were a lot of staff and it was busy. They adhered strictly to all instructions in the ‘patient care’ manual. They removed any drugs TOH had in his possession – lots, and locked them up in a cabinet next to his bed and took away the key. He has a lot of pills and potions and each time he needed any he had to call a nurse who invariably turned up ages later. Each time, she and another member of staff, had to count out the pills he was having and count the remainder as if someone somehow might have picked the lock and stolen some. It was all anoyingly pedantic and when one nurse noticed that a pill was missing she accusingly looked at TOH and demanded to know where it was, looking bemused he said he had already had that one at home prior to arriving, all quite in order, in fact.
Funnily enough, this time around, going in for the same procedure in the same place, although it wasn’t busy there seemed to be less staff. No one took away his pills and potions, no one locked them up and no one counted them out when he needed them. Bizzare.
Of course the surgeon who assured us that only he with his skills could carry out this surgery and promised that he himself would do so, was not there. TOH arrived in theatre, all drugged and drowsy to see a stranger there and demanded to know who he was. He was the surgeons assistant apparently. TOH managed in a drug foggy haze to state that he wasn’t happy about this turn of events, that he had been told his own surgeon would be performing this very tricky procedure. He was by now fully prepped and drugged for the event, but was asked if he wished to leave and go home if he wasn’t happy. At this late stage he decided to stay.
Later, all day later actually, waiting again to be ‘released’ to go home, we were told there were no doctors to sign us out, in fact there was only the one doctor anyway and she was tied up with an emergency. We had to wait. Wait. Wait. Eventually she arrived. Of course she knew nothing of what had occurred during the surgery as she wasn’t there but set about trying to explain, by reading some notes, what had ocurred, though we could have done that ourselves. She was fine until we asked any specific questions when she became flummoxed and tried in vain to see in the notes something that wasn’t mentioned. We let her off.
Afterall we were promised another follow up appointment would be coming in the post.
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