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Your longest wait in Casualty?


SaligoBay

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Montpellier is still winning hands-down over Southampton General for longest wait!

Son hurt his arm at the patinoire at lunchtime, we arrived in Casualty at 2.20pm, got out at....... 6.30pm.  

2 fractures, arm in plaster for 5 weeks, yippee, arrêt de sport for 45 days, silver lining time!!!!     

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Saint Malo will run you close SB.

Daughter cut her arm due to high winds closing the window rapidly, glass broke and put a deep cut in her elbow when she failed to stop it closing. In at 11h00 out at just before 17h00 5 stitches and being a Sunday "yes, long wait but what do you expect" was the caring reply followed by "what no carte vitale or attestation de mutuelle"

US kind of feel about it, no proof no can do but sensibility kicked in, when she was offered proof of address but even after the stitches were out in and whilst she was waiting to sign the forms, she dozed a while after such a long and boring wait and was prompty told "this is not a doss house, no sleeping in the waiting area"

Now to all intent and purpose, she is pretty much completely French when out of the house, so this was not racist and the lady would have offered that line to anyone.

Sorry to hear about your problem, is it your son, the one that is having problems at school ? If so, it might somehow (don't know how though just hoping) be the change in circumstance that will turn your son's fortune's around ? Fingers crossed....................

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It is indeed, Miki, my one remaining loin-fruit.   And strangely, the light glowing in his room right now isn't the sun shining out of him (although that of course happens too ), it's his luminescent plaster cast.   What WILL they think of next! 

Same phenomenon as supermarket queues though, French people just sit and suffer in resignation in the face of these long long waits, broken bones and all.   The revolutionary spirit just ain't what it used to be.   

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5 hours in casualty! We should be so lucky here in Sydney. Take a packed lunched, good book, and plenty of herbal valerian to help kerb temper!

They even speak and move from place to place as if in slow motion and that's just in the waiting room, wait to see what happens when you actually get into the inner sanctum.

I think it must be hospitals all over the world!!
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[quote]Montpellier is still winning hands-down over Southampton General for longest wait! Son hurt his arm at the patinoire at lunchtime, we arrived in Casualty at 2.20pm, got out at....... 6.30pm. 2 f...[/quote]

"we arrived in Casualty at 2.20pm, got out at....... 6.30pm" 

Surely the test of "waiting time" is not what time you got out but what time you had to wait to see a Doctor, how quick to get X- rayed , the problem correctly diagnosed and the treatment started.

With some fractures where manipulation is required anaesthetic is needed, so you have to wait if the patient has just drunk or eaten. 

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Over 7 hours with a THREE year old who, it turns out to have fractured her leg.

Luton and Dunstable hospital, a Sunday evening, arrived at about 5pm, didn't see Triage for about 2 hours, didn't get to see a doctor until 11pm, x-rays shortly after, then another hour for plaster. Didn't get out until after midnight. Outrageous.
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If you get stuck in St Lô, make sure you don't break anything, like your ankle for axample. Dd3 did, and after 5 hours wait in Causualty, we went home as the last bus was about to leave and walking 4 miles with a broken ankle wasn't really an option! When I politely (I was, honestly) informed reception that we couldn't stay any longer, they got really shirty. I was called a bad mother and worse! This after the same snotty receptionist had watched the tears roll down Gabi's cheeks for the last 5 hours...

The next day we went to the Clinique, a complicated journey involving two buses and me virtually carrying a ten year old with my one arm, but all was done and dusted in an hour.

Before you ask, taxis are an endangered species here; you can only get one if you order it at least a week in advance.
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<<Surely the test of "waiting time" is not what time you got out but what time you had to wait to see a Doctor>>

2 hours.

Done the child-with-fractured-leg too, lesLauriers, waited half an hour in So'ton.  Strange, really.

Had 4 or 5 visits to Casualty with daughter there too, impecc.  Even have a nice memory of the loveliest young Australian doctor who got her some chocolate from the vending machine himself to keep her energy levels up.  

And before anyone says - no I don't want to go back and live in Southampton!!!!   It's sunnier here and there aren't so many English people.   

 

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Local hospital in Morlaix - 1.5 hours very late at night, quickest - 5mins in same hospital in early evening. Local private clinic - 25mins longest wait and immediately on arrival with a fracture for the shortest and during the daytime. Can't complain here at all. My brother waited nearly 3 hours at Bedford General to get his son booked in at reception before anyone medical started to turn up,gave up and went 20mins up road to Milton Keynes where he was x-rayed,plastered and back home within 2.5hours.
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Local hospital in Morlaix - 1.5 hours very late at night, quickest - 5mins in same hospital in early evening. Local private clinic - 25mins longest wait and immediately on arrival with a fracture for the shortest and during the daytime. Can't complain here at all. My brother waited nearly 3 hours at Bedford General to get his son booked in at reception before anyone medical started to turn up,gave up and went 20mins up road to Milton Keynes where he was x-rayed,plastered and back home within 2.5hours.
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Local hospital in Morlaix - 1.5 hours very late at night, quickest - 5mins in same hospital in early evening. Local private clinic - 25mins longest wait and immediately on arrival with a fracture for the shortest and during the daytime. Can't complain here at all. My brother waited nearly 3 hours at Bedford General to get his son booked in at reception before anyone medical started to turn up,gave up and went 20mins up road to Milton Keynes where he was x-rayed,plastered and back home within 2.5hours.
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Can't say I have had much of a wait in the Royal Berks, I think once with something non serious we were there a couple of hours but apart from that, pretty quick - instant in the case of my son who had a 'zipper' problem ! (He was screaming so loud I think they just wanted to get rid of him )

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St Gaudens - weekday morning maximum wait 5 minutes.  Probably due to the fact that there was no-one else waiting and also that the patient's face was swollen up like a balloon and he could hardly breathe due to an allergic reaction! It just had to be my Australian brother-in-law who got sick staying with us last summer with my poor sister who was 7 and a half months pregnant at the time.  I don't think the staff knew who to give priority to - the non-French speaking man not beathing or the fluent French speaking woman with him who looked like she was just about to give birth!
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I've been lucky so far, we've always been seen very quickly. The slowest was in our local clinique where we had to wait for a doctor (and a nurse and the receptionist- we just wandered up and down opening doors and asking if someone could help) the fastest was aix hospital on an easter sunday. We arrived with a screaming 2 year old with blood pouring from his head and said he had fallen on the stairs. We bypassed the waiting room completely. we weren't exactly popular with the tens of people waiting and who looked like they had been there since the beginning of lent, It was just that they heard child and head and went into overdrive (It was a cut eyebrown and only needed 2 stitches. It got a bit embarrassing when they kept asking how far down  he had fallen- he had fallen up the stairs, but there's no way of explaining that simply in french)

 

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[quote]Can't say I have had much of a wait in the Royal Berks, I think once with something non serious we were there a couple of hours but apart from that, pretty quick - instant in the case of my son who ha...[/quote]

Ever been there on a Saturday night, Gaye? I think you'd find that waiting times are a teeny bit longer then, from what I hear. Despite living 5 minutes down the road I managed to keep well away from the place during my time as a citizen of Reading. Making up for it now, tho'. Becoming depressingly familiar with the inside of French hospitals (sigh!!).

Val
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[quote]Montpellier is still winning hands-down over Southampton General for longest wait! Son hurt his arm at the patinoire at lunchtime, we arrived in Casualty at 2.20pm, got out at....... 6.30pm. 2 f...[/quote]

When I went to casualty in Southampton my average wait was between 4 - 6 hours, although I have had a 8 hour wait, but that was because i had taken one of my foster children with a broken and dislocated toe. the wait wasn't the hospitals fault, they had to have written permission from the duty social worker, so we had to wait for her to arrive.

When we were on holiday in Cornwall, I had an accident with the dogs metal chain round my ankle and thought that I had broken something, we went to the local hospital and from entering it and leaving, I had Xrays, foot strapped up and issued with crutches and was out in 35 mins, that is what I call service.

tricia b

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Went the day badly ................

A couple of years ago my wife needed surgery and had to check into the hospital at 15.00. We decided to finish some wallpapering in the morning, then I was intended to drive Mrs mpprh to the hospital.

At 11.45 I wisely decided to change the blade in the carpet cutter. A bit stiff, a bit of brute force and it slipped. No pain as I saw it slice my thumb. I saw the bone, strangely no blood, still no pain. Then lots of blood ......... everywhere. Grab dirty rag and arrive at doctors to find it was the sacred lunchtime. Drive to Lunel : what I thought was a hospital turned out to be an old folks home. So back home, quick bite and Mrs mpprh got me to casualty (conveniently next door to her hospital) at 14.00.

The treatment was thorough and rapid. But I had to wait until 21.30 to be seen. I was frequently told "don't worry you are next". Equally frequently was the arrival by helicopter of more serious customers. Can you believe that people could be so inconsiderate as to drive their scooters into walls ? One even fell under a tram to get in the front of the queue.

So at 23.00 I set off to drive home using one hand. I was back at 07.30 the next morning to wait for Mrs mpprh to emerge from theatre. There had been a delay and she was back in her room at 11.30.

Same hospital as Saligo Bay.

The time wasn't wasted ......... they have 394 floor tiles in the waiting room !

Peter

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On a visit to UK my wife had severe abdominal pain and went to local hospital at Tameside Greater Manchester, after 12 hours in agony she still hadn't seen the triage nurse, saw the nurse after 13 hours and told another 4 hours wait.  She gave up as we were returning to Brittany that evening.

On return to France she had the same pain and we went to Ploermel hospital, she saw the doctor within 10 minutes, had various tests including scan, x-ray, blood tests and gastRoscopy (I think that is the spelling) within one hour and was admitted for an op which was completed the next day.  SUPERB.

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Next time you have an emergency on a fri or sat night make your way to Oldham town centre....they now have a specialist  ambulance/paramedic unit unit on site for the next 3 weeks to see to the drunks coming out of the nightclubs and fighting for a taxi home!  Mrs O
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My longest wait in casualty in UK was just over 4 hours. Youngest ,then aged 5 had tripped up in playground at lunchtime, banged her head and cut her lip. Triage was ASAP but xrays and full exam about 2 hours, and another 2 hours sat waiting for a doctor to assess xrays,(she then played Mary in the nativity 2 days later as a battered wife....2 black eyes!!) next visit we were in and out before our driver had parked the car....same daughter had wound a piece of cotton so tight around one of her fingers during assembly that her finger end had gone white! Mrs O

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