NHS is dicking me

Bengaboy

Bengaboy

Bengaboy

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1 Sep 2007
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I basically need surgery on one of my eyes (not confirmed, but it is the only way to correct them), and I had my 1st appointment at the Royal Eye Infirmary in Plymouth in October. They said you will have to have a 2nd appointment due to them not having the proper apparatus to do whatever they needed to assess my eyes, within a month, 2 at the latest.

Fast forward to 2 weeks ago, and I have just had my 2nd appointment... :eek:

The apparatus they needed were 2 ruler type things with different prisms on them, Im sure they will have had some knocking around somewhere, but when I found out it was this, I was gobsmacked...The appointment was 5 mins long.

He then said I need to see another specialist, and have it booked for May 10th. I cant go due to work commitments. And desperately need this before then, or else I wont be able to have it until August.

Is there anything I can do to complain to get my appointment moved forward? This is actually starting to affect my life, and am getting extremely annoyed. I know the NHS is majorly tight on money - but this is surely taking the ****.

End of rant! :)
 
Van Hellseek said:
Try getting the same treatment in another country.

Then you might learn to appreciate getting it at all. Let alone having to wait a bit.
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Thats a bit unfair really - I pay taxes, Ive never had any problems regarding surgery EVER, and just like anyone wouldnt expect to wait a year until receiving an appointment. People who sponge of the government and pay nothing towards anything get everything, so why should I be different?

Also, I live in England, we have the NHS, I expect a service from them. If I was in a different country, then it would be different. But, I don't...
 
it took the NHS 6 months to remove a very painful kidney stone for me, but I am grateful they did it, looking back I was well looked after, it took a long time but by god it was worth it, just be thankfully the NHS is there for you now you need them
 
Van Hellseek said:
Yeah, the promised land of perfect free public services.
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I agree, not perfect, but you cannot dispute the fact that a 2nd appointment (which was an extremely simple one) took almost half a year to sort out and is downright shocking. Bear in mind that this is not a general hospital, but a part of the NHS that is dedicated to the health of eyes. This is almost certainly not on.
 
When I had a nasty eye-injury a few years ago now, the REI at Plymouth was nothing short of fantastic.

It may not just be equipment you're dealing with but also getting hold of a trained specialist and contending with any waiting list.

Why can't you get it off work? Surely your health and eyesight are more important than any work commitment? Speak to your employer.
 
Nix said:
When I had a nasty eye-injury a few years ago now, the REI at Plymouth was nothing short of fantastic.

It may not just be equipment you're dealing with but also getting hold of a trained specialist and contending with any waiting list.

Why can't you get it off work? Surely your health and eyesight are more important than any work commitment? Speak to your employer.
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If you had an actual injury to your eye then I would imagine you would have been put on high priority and would have been seen to quicker - this is certainly understandable and of course acceptable.

And at such a busy point at work - they have already told me I definitely would not be able to have the time off. I can appreciate why, but it is still majorly pants! :(
 
Van Hellseek said:
Try getting the same treatment in another country.

Then you might learn to appreciate getting it at all. Let alone having to wait a bit.
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Given that a person earning the average wage pays over £1200 per year to the NHS I think that it would be quite easy to get.
 
Bengaboy said:
If you had an actual injury to your eye then I would imagine you would have been put on high priority and would have been seen to quicker - this is certainly understandable and of course acceptable.

And at such a busy point at work - they have already told me I definitely would not be able to have the time off. I can appreciate why, but it is still majorly pants! :(
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I hate to have to spell out the obvious, but the NHS as an organisation simply cannot be dancing to every individual's song; it's impossible.

You're the one that needs their service, so you're the one who'll have to make concessions.

Either tell work in no uncertain terms you're not going to be available for work due to get something wrong will your health fixed - something which is ALWAYS a priority over any job - or go sick.

Don't allow your employer to dictate terms. You've given them enough warning. You've already waited long enough. If you need it that badly, you have to do what you have to do I'm afraid.

If it's seriously becoming detrimental to your life, then your employer is a pretty major backside to not allow you the realtively small time off to solve it.

Sorry if that comes across brash or rude, as I understand I don't have the whole picture, but to me, I think you just need to get your priorities straight and be more assertive. The appointment isn't the issue here, your job is.
 
Energize said:
Given that a person earning the average wage pays over £1200 per year to the NHS I think that it would be quite easy to get.
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That's not true. Taxation, including NI, goes to a general pool. That's one reason why the Conservatives are investigating reforming the tax service to lump everything together in a more honest way.

The way to consider things like this is to think about what you have to pay for dental treatment these days. That is the only point where most of us have to face the very high cost of health care.

As someone else said, if you're at the low priority end of the spectrum you have to deal with delays and inconveniences. But if you go in with a heart attack or having fallen off your motor bike you'll get a whole heap of very expensive attention very quickly. It's a tricky balancing act I wouldn't like to have to make decisions about.

Having said all that, good luck to the OP with his eye problems. I only have one good eye and would get fairly stressed if I was having trouble getting reassuringly prompt treatment.

Andrew McP
 
Andrew_McP said:
That's not true. Taxation, including NI, goes to a general pool. That's one reason why the Conservatives are investigating reforming the tax service to lump everything together in a more honest way.
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The tax rate for the average wage is 35.3%, with ~11% of that funding the NHS, with dental costs, eyecare costs, and prescriptions the figure is about right for healthcare costs.
 
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In some case, it's well worthwhile paying to see a specialist privately and being treated on the NHS.

An example from personal experience:

I had constant pain in one testicle. Obviously worrying. Went to my GP, who examined me, said there was probably nothing majorly wrong and referred me to a consultant urologist. All well and good - seeing a relevant specialist was the appropriate next step.

I got an appointment for over a year later.

I went private and saw the same specialist a couple of days later.

After he examined me and explained everything in detail with diagrams because I wanted to know, he referred me back to the NHS for surgery, which I had a couple of weeks later. It didn't fix the pain, but it confirmed that nothing was wrong and that was my main concern. The pain is almost always minor and I've learnt to become used to it. What was bothering me was the worry that the pain was a symptom of something, maybe something fatal.

Cost me £100 for the consultation (~25 minutes), about 10 years ago. Treatment is prohibitively expensive, but you can buy a doctor's time for something affordable.

It looks like I'm going to have to do the same again, as I'm currently ill with an undiagnosed cause, the NHS have lost my scan results, I'm getting a wildly varying degree of interest from the different doctors I've seen at my surgery and I've no idea when I'll get to see the gastro-enterologist on the NHS (which might not even be the right speciality anyway, since neither my heart nor my thyroid have been ruled out as a root cause).

The NHS is extremely fast in some ways, but extremely slow in others. It can be worth buying attention from a doctor to work around the extremely slow parts of the NHS.
 
Go and speak with your GP and see if they can help expedite things. This is the sort of problem that their role is as your advocate
 
tell work to do one if you need an operation go sick! in fact where I work you cannot take annual leave if you are in fact sick, you have to go sick!
 
Stop asking your employer and tell them you're not coming in as you're going in for an operation/treatment which if not had not will likely cause anxiety and depression which would see you off work for weeks.
 
A little trick.
When ringing up the appointments hotline tell them you are willing to go to another hospital and you may have more luck (they won't ask you this).
This works every time for my Mum and eldest daughter who have eye problems.
 
Bengaboy said:
And at such a busy point at work - they have already told me I definitely would not be able to have the time off. I can appreciate why, but it is still majorly pants! :(
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As has been pointed out, its not the NHS "dicking" you, its your work. Health trumps work, end of.
 
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