A&E or walk in emergency centre?

[Daibell]

We have a Walk-in Centre about 7 miles away and it's open 8 til 8 7 days a week. We've used it a few times and it's very good when the GP surgery is closed or you need more than the 10 minutes you get at the surgery. I would avoid calling 111 like the plague and try to get to the walk-in centre or surgery but if urgent would call 999 or drive to A&E.

 

[Brunneria]

It's becoming very clear that we all need to know about how our local services are set up long before we actually need them!

I had no idea how much variation there is between different services. So much for a National HS.

Since our walk in centre is only open for 10 hrs a week, and my local surgery is shut evenings, nights, and most of the weekend (and usually insists on a 5 day wait for appointments), I think A&E will continue to be my emergency option.

 

[Robinredbreast]

We had a walk in walk in centre,a sper but it was closed a couple of years ago. I used it once when I woke up with a terrible pain in my back ( as I was going to visit the hospital

True, but fractures are included on the list for walk in centres. They usually occur after accidents. This was why I was scared (yes scared) to go to A&E 18 months ago with a couple of broken bones. We are now told that A&E is basically just E ! I phoned my GP's surgery and was told I had to wait 5 days for an appointment and all the emergency ones at the end of surgery that day were full, so they sent me to A&E. I felt that was the right place all along but as I had seen the adverts on TV saying if it's not a life threatening emergency.....

We used to have a walk in centre in the hospital grounds, but it closed about 2 years ago. Now, when I broke my wrist last year and the first time I had ever broken a bone, I went to A & E, I rang my friend and she took me there. With the pain I was experiencing, and by the look of it, if there was was a choice between A&E and a walk in clinic, I would go to A & E. I could see and feel that my wrist was not good, but obviously I am not in the medical profession to give a 'real' diagnosis..
I wasn't in a life threatening position, but a walk in centre would of been no good to me at that time.
Whilst in A & E, I saw another person, a guy, who also broke his wrist, playing football, someone who woke up with back pain and another person a possible sprain ? but not for A & E, this was a Sunday afternoon.

 

[Robinredbreast]

I have found walk in centres are worse than useless, we have one about 6 miles away at the local hospital opening hours 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday during the summer only. Same with its A&E unit.
The one at the local heath centre is the same but is open all year round.
The next nearest is at the main hospital 11 miles away in the A&E unit, I'm not sure of the hours, but as the out of hours Dr's run it you can wait in there for hours if the dr has been called out.
My experience there went like this, I managed to scrape up a large flap of skin on my right shin, I carefully wrapped it in cling film with the flap closed over the wound, now as a prolific bleeder I then wrapped a couple of clean tea towels round it to contain any blood, I arrived at the walk in centre and told the nurse at the desk what I had done, I also told her I was diabetic and on blood thinners, she said take a seat the triage nurse will be with you shortly, 15 mins later the triage nurse took off the towels and cling film allowing a lot of blood to escape and pulled back the bit of skin and left it open, she said wait here the dr needs to see this before I can stitch it,
So 1 hr later the skin is curling up, I'm still bleeding over the floor and my numbers have plummeted to 2-5, my son the went to get me a coke to up my numbers, the nurse says I can't have anything till I've seen the dr, I tell her I'm hypoing and she says why didn't I tell her I was diabetic, a row ensues as I reminded her I had and she had it on the screen I was diabetic on thinners, she then says I should be in A&E across the hall.
So over the hall we go and of course by then, the flap of skin that could have been stitched back has well and truly died so I had to have a piece of plastic skin put on with sterri strips and the healing time was 18 months instead of a few weeks.and endless visits to the nurse at the drs every other day to have the dressing changed,
I now have a huge brown scar on the front of my leg that is not only ugly but has the weirdest sensation when touched, it also has perpetual flaky skin that no amount of moisturising seems to fix.
I still think if you have high numbers and an infection at a injection site, and you are unable to see your own dr the best place is A&E, as I have been told that ketoacidosis is a killer, and with the high numbers and infection that is a possibility, of course I could be wrong but I wouldn't like to take the risk.

How awful for you sd, what a nasty, scary experience.

 

[Bluetit1802]

Sometimes it is better to call the ambulance service, explain the situation, and if it isn't immediately life threatening they will send a first response team with a paramedic. This happened to me when I had bad abdominal pains, which got better but then I fainted. My husband panicked and rang 999. A paramedic and colleague arrived by car in no time, assessed me, did an ECG and other obs, took glucose test etc. declared I was fine but suggested I went to hospital just in case. I declined as I had recovered and felt normal.

 

[satindoll]

Our local ambulance station was closed and now the two ambulances sit outside the health centre about a mile away, we have a first response paramedic team in a car who sit there and will come for motor accidents, chest/abdominal pain and maternity needs but that's about it, other than accidents on the motorway as well, your on your own especially after dark,
When hubs had his heart attack they came reasonably quickly in 10mins, and they sent for the ambulance which arrived shortly after, but when I had mine in 2002 hubs had to drive me from the Dr's surgery to the hospital in my car as there were no ambulances available, and it was quicker than waiting for the ambulance to come the 11miles from the hospital.

 

[satindoll]

How awful for you sd, what a nasty, scary experience.

It wasn't my favourite way to spend a Saturday evening for sure, all in all we were there 5 hours.

 

[graj0]

Also when I broke my sternum and a rib I didn't consider that to be life threatening so I phoned my surgery only to be told to go straight to A&E.

Most breaks and fractures are considered to be life threatening by the medical community, even if we don't. At least my wife's old friend, a GP for 30+ years now, and visiting from the wilds of Middlesborough, seemed to think so.

 

[donnellysdogs]

Our practice website says

"If you require urgent medical assistance, which cannot wait until the surgery re-opens, please dial 111 to put you through to the NHS 111 service.

If you have a life threatening medical emergency, please ring 999

The nearest “Walk in Centre” is xxxxxx xxxxxxand is open 8am to 8pm 7 days a week including all Bank Holidays ."

My hubby didn't realise we had one but I just thought that it was important that we all should know if other options to A&E.

My thoughts were: I was taken by 2 medics, 1 paramedic to hospital on Weds. Perhaps I should hsve gone to the emergency centre first and they may have treated me better than A&E.

Thats my thoughts... Just are we using services correctly (if we have them?" Or are we even aware of them?

Thank you for your responses. I think they have highlighted how different our NHS is according to postcodes!!!

Thanks for responses, I think they are enlightening...it gives me food for thought regarding patients in my local area and whether my PPG should be highlighting that there is a walk in centre nearby....

 

[satindoll]

I wouldn't give anyone tuppence for the 111 service/out of hour Dr's my friends mother called them, she had abdo pain and vomiting, they said drink plenty and if not better in 24 hrs call back, so she did, but she wasn't keeping the water down either, so on the Monday my friend called the Gp who refused to go and see her mum so my friend took her to the hospital herself, she died two days later of a burst appendix, a chilling experience of the 111 lack of care and a GP's *&^%$£)(

 

[Bluetit1802]

@satindoll

That is appalling. I hope complaints were made otherwise this service will never improve

All the 111 service call operators do is ask specific questions that come up on their screen - not unlike the NHS Choices website where you can check out your symptoms. Then they advise you according to what their screen says, which is usually wait 24 hours, see your GP, or go to A&E. I have heard many awful stories. It would be my very, very, very, last port of call.

 

[satindoll]

@Bluetit1802
Many complaints have been made about it, their excuse was if she was that ill she should have called the GP, der the surgery is closed on the weekend and the phone is put through to the 111 service, then she should have gone to A&E, er she was an 85 year old disabled pensioner and unable to afford the £30 taxi fare, she should have asked a neighbour or relative to take her, er she lived in an isolated cottage with no near neighbours and her daughter my friend was in London on a work program.
So obviously it was my friends fault that her mother died, as she was at work to earn the money to pay in tax to keep the government's pension fund fat, or pay for their private health packages.
Don't get me started on the GP =====

 

[Bluetit1802]

@satindoll

That poor old lady. Her family must have been distraught. It just smacks of the "It's not our fault" culture in many areas where there is a monopoly with no competition.

 

[Brunneria]

That's horrific @satindoll
I'm so sorry for your friend and her mother.

 

[donnellysdogs]

It is frightening. So sorry to hear of this loss of life with your friends mum. Scandalous.

It seems that when it was GP or 999 that we all stood a better chance. Things are so much more complicated with 111, no out of hours GPs, limited walk in access etc.

 

[satindoll]

@Bluetit1802 @Brunneria
Devastation just about covers it, the worst part of it being if the GP had kept her word and called to see her on the previous Wednesday as she had promised or even on the Friday there may have been a chance she would still be here.

 

[tim2000s]

I know it's not an appropriate time but this does seem like a case of gross negligence on the part of the NHS and lawyers should be involved.

 

[satindoll]

Knowing it and proving it are two different pigs, we all know the professionals stick together like c--p to a blanket, according to the death certificate she died of septicaemia due to a ruptured appendix, you have the money for lawyers my friend doesn't.

 

[Robinredbreast]

I wouldn't give anyone tuppence for the 111 service/out of hour Dr's my friends mother called them, she had abdo pain and vomiting, they said drink plenty and if not better in 24 hrs call back, so she did, but she wasn't keeping the water down either, so on the Monday my friend called the Gp who refused to go and see her mum so my friend took her to the hospital herself, she died two days later of a burst appendix, a chilling experience of the 111 lack of care and a GP's *&^%$£)(

What a terrible way for a life to end, so tragic and with what seems to be incompetence with lack of care for the patient

 

[satindoll]

@Robinredbreast
Wicked and shameful, but she was of the generation that believed all DR's were gods, and what the Dr said was gospel, you and I know different.