Hospitals

I hate hospitals … but thank goodness they and the NHS are there for us all in times of need. They seem to be getting a lot of flak these days but that’s not down to the staff, that’s down to mismanagement at the top, underfunding and ineptitude from those whom we have elected to govern and run our country along with our public health services.

Two weeks past on Saturday afternoon, Lady B called NHS111 at 4pm after I had taken ill. The emergency doctor appeared at 8pm and immediately called for an emergency ambulance. He said it would be with us within the hour and off he went leaving a Note for the ambulance crew. The ‘emergency’ ambulance turned up at 5.00am in the early hours of Sunday morning. Had we known it would take so long we would have made other arrangements but the ambulance service kept calling back with updates saying an ambulance would be with us shortly!

On arrival at Monklands Hospital I was rather dismayed to see three Police cars amongst the waiting ambulances. Three Police officers were ‘on guard’ at one of the assessment cubicles while another officer was being treated for a ‘glass wound’ in another cubicle! It’s not just the NHS that are having hard time, eh? In all fairness, Reception was relatively quiet and there was only a short wait in the corridor before I was received and assessed after which I was transferred to a ward.

I don’t remember much till later that day when I was transferred to another ward and treatment commenced. That first night was a nightmare. There were four other guys in the ward and we were all getting treatments hourly, 2 hourly or 4 hourly which meant a constant flow of nurses and doctors and no chance to rest.

Visions remain of ghostly apparitions during the night. What appeared to be a headless and legless ghost of a nurse floated into the ward pushing the five castored skeletal spawn of R2D2 with its array of flashing lights, beeps and buzzers. A downlighter cast an eerie glow over the contraption and the ethereal being which was pushing it as each ‘victim’ was hooked up, jabbed and checked throughout the night. It didn’t matter whether the patient was asleep or not, the clanking onslaught continued.

There was one other incident. A wee nurse birled into the ward like the Looney Tunes Tasmanian Devil cartoon character, whipped back the blankets plunged a needle the size of a dipstick into my stomach, whilst chortling and chanting: “Oops, we nearly forgot this” before disappearing like a white tornado back out of the room. I thought it was a dream till I saw the big purple bruise in the morning.

What hastened my recovery was the quality of the cooking. No, not in the hospital, but back home. Having sampled the first evening meal of four fish fingers, carrots and a dollop of mash, the desire to escape back to normality was compulsive. I sent a photo of lunch back home which prompted the question: “How did you know it was mushroom soup?” To which I replied: “I saw the plate with the mushroom growing out of it before they poured in the soup!”

In all fairness, catering for such a transient and diverse group of people in such a large establishment must be difficult, although it does seem to help motivate people to get better and get out!

I still hate hospitals, but I’m ever so grateful for their attention and care, Even so, I'm thankful to be out and back home. Normal service will be resumed shortly!