My husband visited St Paul's after noticing a bump whilst looking at straight objects he was advised by an optician to go straight away. We attended A&E and despite only a few people waiting our visit was turned into a total fiasco. On arrival nobody was on the main desk we waited 15mins to be handed a piece of paper to fill in by a man who appeared to be a porter, he told us the computer was down, we then saw a nurse in a corridor who scribbled a few details on another piece of of paper,after this we were sent back outside to wait. The nursing staff were unengaging and spent the whole time chatting in the corridors about their personal life or checking their watches in order not to miss lunch and tea breaks. We were told he needed a scan but kept waiting for hours then eventually told he couldn't have a scan as the department was closed. We were then given an appointment for the next day we returned and on arrival they spent 40mins trying to find the scribbled notes from the previous visit,at first we were treated as if we had not even attended the previous day with the staff implying it was us at fault, on our insistence they eventually found the notes pushed to the back of a large metal storage cabinet. Once they had these the whole process started again, once again not being sent for the scan he needed as it was now too late and the department was closing. He eventually saw a lady who told him nothing and misdiagnosed his problem as macular degeneration. On leaving we were told an appointment would be sent out, this appointment arrived for about five weeks later, in the meantime we visited his excellent optholmatist optician who instantly took scan an told him he did not have macular degeneration at all he did in fact have a problem with the membrane at the back of his eye. The whole St Paul's A&E experience was a disgrace and was mainly down to the fact that we were made our visit in the period between Christmas and new year. It is frightening to think the whole thing comes to a virtually useless grinding halt because we have entered a holiday period. The interesting thing was that there did appear to be a lot staff on duty but they just couldn't be bothered to deal with the small handful of patients when they did it was just a mixed up fiasco.
"Complaint St Pauls"
About: The Royal Liverpool University Hospital The Royal Liverpool University Hospital Liverpool L7 8XP
Posted via nhs.uk
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