Life support has been withdrawn from Alfie Evans

I have never worked in the NHS but as a regular visitor to in-patients and being an extremely astute observer, I know enough to persuade me that it isn't anywhere near as efficient as you obviously believe. Would that it is, but it ain't. Just like all other institutions in this dysfunctional country of mine, it has become inefficient and broken. My sister, who was having chemotherapy and therefore was supposed to be prioritised, was kept waiting in an A&E waiting room for just over 4 effing hours before she was seen, and one of the reasons was that drunks kept being brought in who had been glassed in fights, and because they were bleeding meant they had to take precedence over her.

 

Thank you for making BB's point that you don't even have any grasp whatsoever of how basic medical triage functions.

FTR that is how it operates all around the entire world.

 

I just gave an example of triage not working ffs! I'm now fed up with your trolling, and will use the ignore facility if it doesn't stop.

 

Triage always PRIORITIZES bleeding over something routine like chemo.

Feel free to prove me wrong about that.

 

In the UK, chemo is done in Accident & Emergency? Surely you can't be serious.

 

I'm sorry your sister has cancer, but the fact she's receiving chemo isn't enough in itself to allow her to jump the queue.
Patients are seen in order of need.
Someone with a suspected heart attack or stroke (for example) would be seen straight away.
Emergencies are admitted all the time.

 

No, of course not. Cerberus meant because his sister was undergoing chemotherapy she should have been given priority.
I'm not sure where he got that idea from, but it's not true.

People are taken to accident and emergency for all different reasons, from life endangering injuries to a broken toe.

 

Oh. I didn't see it like that! Although his position is so absurd, I just couldn't have imagined it! So the only way I could see it is that his sister was there for a chemo treatment!

 

Voluntary cases of injury such as being drunk and getting involved in violence should IN NO WAY take precedence over a person who is in A&E because morphine can no longer alleviate the pain unless it is increased, and that's what she was there for? And someone with a suspected heart attack should have been seen before a drunk too, because nobody 'volunteers' to have a heart attack.

 

Your sister would have been better off calling out the emergency GP, or the district nurses taking care of her.
That's what we did for my mum when the pain got bad.

Ah, right. I should have known you meant that in your opinion she should have been seen before other people.
You'll know better next time, that rather than take your sister to accident and emergency the next time she needs her pain
relief altered, to call out the district nurses or the emergency GP, rather than clutter up the waiting room.

 

If she and her husband had known that's what would happen they probably wouldn't have gone there 'to clutter up the A&E waiting room' (what a disgusting thing to say, and **** you!!) in the first place; but they'd been assured they would be prioritised, so that's where they went. Also district nurses wouldn't have been authorised to up the dosage of morphine. I'd like to know why you believe a drunk should be triaged sooner than someone like her, or someone with a suspected heart attack? You sure have got a weird rationale.

 

<Mod Edit>

Are you aware that alcohol has a toxicity that can kill?

Would you be happy if a 15 year old who was experimenting with alcohol died because someone who could have been treated as an outpatient demanded priority

Triage has very very specific guidelines as to who is seen first and you do not know who or what is in that room ahead of you

 

<Mod Edit> Let me try and put it to you as simply as I can - nobody needs to get drunk, but conversely, nobody chooses to contract a fatal illness, so which of those categories do you think should be triaged first? <Mod Edit>

 

So her visit to A&E was related to her chemo treatment? Which in turn relates to morphine?

 

If your sister felt well enough to travel to A&E, then her need couldn't have been that desperate.
The first thing the triage nurse asked me last time I went to A & E, was concerned any pain I had and whether I'd had pain relief.

Who assured them they'd be prioritised? Whoever it was was wrong.

 

It was related to the increasing pain - tumours press against internal organs and the central nervous system, and that obviously causes the pain. Cancer, per se, is painless.

 

<Rule 2> The fact that someone is in pain doesn't mean they can't get into a car to seek relief from it somewhere else does it? What, do you think they should stay put then?? <Off-topic>

 

I find it hard to believe that of your sister's cancer was that advanced, she didn't have a care plan and daily visits from the district nurse.
I had a list phone numbers to call if my mum needed more pain relief and so did my friend's husband.

<Reply to Deleted> My niece is a charge nurse in an A & E department and my cousin a Macmillan nurse.
Quite apart from the fact I cared for my mum when she had terminal cancer.

It does if they're on morphine, which now which needs topping up to relieve the pain.

Especially when the tumours have grown large enough to press on internal bones and organs.
.

<Reply to Deleted>
Yes stay put and wait for help, which is much better than enduring a car journey and waiting around in a busy A & E department.

 

I can certainly see how you would be pissed off by drunk people being given priority because it is very easy to assume that they have gotten drunk voluntarily, even though there are cases where a girl has had her drinks spiked all night long. And regarding violence, this is not quite so easy to assume that they've been participating in violent activities because it can just as easily be the case that they have been attacked without provocation. So I can see why you'd be pissed, however, it is the case that doctors must preserve life regardless of circumstance.

 

If someone has a death wish, and binge drinkers certainly do have one, then the doctors should ignore them in favour of those who are seriously ill and don't have a death wish.

 

Are call out options available via NHS after hours?

 

How would doctors be able to assess this in the heat of the moment?

 

There certainly are.

 

Here is a newsflash: Pain does not override bleeding when it comes to triage. A heart attack IN PROGRESS would be triaged BEFORE someone needing a higher dose of pain meds. Passing a kidney stone can be excruciatingly painful but it still does NOT get priority over someone bleeding out. You can live through pain but you can't live through losing pints and pints of blood.

 

It's not really as simple as that, either. People are assessed when they come to A & E, then the relevant doctors on call are alerted.
Obviously, in the case of serious injury or something like a heart attack, they're seen immediately by emergency staff who themselves alert the relevant doctors who hurry to the scene.

I don't know all the ins and outs where Cerberus's sister is concerned, but she certainly would have been asked about her level of pain and then , probably, the oncologist on call would have been alerted.

It's not so much the drunks were seen before her, but rather they needed different treatment.