SANDY'S BLOG: The latest comments will be posted nearest the heading and to help identify I will always put the date first and the blogging aftterwards.

Wednesday: 6th January 2010 - NHS Up Date

Okay, I admit it, I am surprised. Today I received a letter from the consultant at Northwick Park Hospital who was responding to the letter that I sent to him, which I thought had been passed to the young female doctor I had seen when I visited, there, to deal with. Apparently I was wrong.

The consultant wrote me a very nice letter which actually addressed (I think) all the issues I raised when I sent my letter of complaint to him. It now occurs to me that I was far from the only patient whose details were not logged into the hospital system correctly.

You may perphaps remember that having filled in the form asking for certain details, including your doctor's surgery and address, the letter sent to 'my' surgery following the appointment I attended was sent to an unknown sergery in a completely different part of the area of where I live and that explains why my doctor did not get any feedback following my hospital visit.

(Unfortunately that unknown surgery probably felt that as they did not have a patient by my name and address that instead of returning to the hospital to inform them of their mistake, they simply threw it away. The result of this is that no one would know and no corrections made! It was fortunate that I asked for a copy of the correspondence to be sent to me, and had enough common sense to check the surgery address and then contact the hospital to tell them of their error)

So, back to the letter. Although I still cannot see how the details on a simple form were not put into the hospital system, no matter when the information was input, apparently the proper prosedure was not being adhered to in about 50% of the time when new patients hand their paperwork over at reception. This matter is now being monitored, so that is excellent.

Unfortunately for the young female doctor I saw, she has been spoken to by the consultant who feels that I did not get the best treatment. Additionally, he has now reinstated the appointment she cancelled. (Interesting becuase I remember her saying on the phone to me that 'after consultation with the consultant, he agreed that no further action need be taken' - so did she make this up?) He also confirmed he wants to to have the blood test that was originally requested by her and finally that when I come for the appointment, that he, himself would like to see me. Not absolutely sure if this is for the whole consultation, or just one of his minions has seen me. Oh well.

Whilst I really do appreciate that I will now been seen at Northwick Park Hospital again, I feel it would have been nice had the consultant phoned my GP and actually spoken to her, because he would then be aware that I have a blood test already booked and might not need another one so soon afterwards - especially considering how far I will have to travel just to get blood taken in what will likely be a five min or less visit.

I will update again next week because after I get blood taken for testing, I plan to visit my surgery and leave a message for my doctor to see what she thinks about the consultants letter and whether or not I need to have blood taken again (and especially if I do, if I could have it done back at the local clinic where I will be going beforehand.)

Tuesday 22nd December 2009 Travel Insurance/NHS/Computers

COMPTERS & IDIOT 'S ( like me) WHO USE THEM: I have spent the better part of four or so hours working on updating my website. I had done a lot , typing out this new Blog page and writing all about the new MiniBear Project (Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs) that I am working on, and so you can imagine how I felt when the whole screen sort of 'greyed out' and I couldn't do anything with it! I had that sneeking suspicion that it had frozen and I knew that that meant I would have to get the task manager up and dreadful though it would be, would have to just end the task. Then I remembered that I had not saved anything I had been doing! Oh dear! All that work, lost! All that time wasted! Still, what can you do. I was sort of hoping I might have saved something - anything, but when I looked again the sytem had gone right back to before all the changes! My own fault. Nothing I could do, but decided to try again and would you believe it, this time I had not got much done when the system froze me out again! Even more stupidly, I didn't think I had done enough to save any of it and yep, when I rebooted again, it was back to before any changes were made!! Third effort, I saved everything a paragraph at a time!!

THE NHS: In July 09 I discovered that I was not as fit and well as I had thought I was. I woke one morning not long after my birthday (mid July) to find the sight in my left eye felt 'odd'. I ended up the following day at the A&E department of the famous London Eye hospital, Moorefields near Old Street Station.

It took just three more weeks and another visit to the A&E Department for the sight in that eye to deteriorate so that I felt I had to try and look through an opaque covering. Fortunately my right eye seemed fine, but now I was not sure as I tried to look out of both eyes, if I could see anything at all out of the left one. It was only when I covered the right one up that I knew for certain that although I could see some things, that it wasn't much. I was soon diagnosed with Non-Arteritic Anterior Ischemic Optic Neuropathy - left eye. The consultant explained it to me as a 'stroke affecting the eye'. It was a blockage in the tiny blood vessles in the eye but unlike a stroke affecting another part of the anatomy, damage was permanent and non-repairable.

The bad news for me was that I had been told they didn't know why I had suffered that and the only thing that could be done for me was to try and determine the cause, see if that was treatable because there was the chance that the same thing could happen to my right eye and let me tell you dear reader, that I was totally devistated at the thought of being blind! One doctor there did try and cheer me up by saying that devistating though it was to me to loose so much sight so quickly, I could have suffered a stroke and been paralysed, or brain damaged or some other equally horrible secenario.

The NHS is an excellence form of healthcare, especially when it works. It has to take care of millions and millions of people here in the UK and I suppose that unfortunately there are problems, errors, mistakes but they take on a whole different feeling when it is you that is affected. My local doctor's surgery has something like 15 1/2 (fisteen & a half thousand) thousand patients just on their books. That is a lot of patients they are responsible for, especially when you realise how many of them don't have English as their first language.

My surgery has to limit the time each patient is seem by their doctor - which I suppose is reasonable. For many of us the days have long gone when you saw the same doctor, they would know your family, your medical history and you were an indiviaul in your own right to them. With so many to treat nowadays, you often get seen by different doctors and if you are lucky enough not to need to visit them that often, then when you do need to, your medical history is limited. I admit I have been very lucky and the only consistent medical treatment I have experienced was when I had my daughters but now I am afraid I now fall into a different category and will have to make regular trips to my surgery!

Okay, back to the events after my eye diagnosis. Being scared to death that I was going to experience the same problem in my good eye, I was naturally eagre to find out what the cause had been and do what had to be done to stop it happening to my other eye. Thus I thought Moorefields would contact my surgery quickly with the results of the blood tests they took on my last visit. I did phone my surgery to confirm that if it was necessary for me to receive treatment for something as a result of those tests, that the surgery would contact me. Due to the then nature of the surgery's appointment booking system, trying to make an appointment was difficult, which is why I asked the question. I was rather hoping that if I couldn't get through to them, that they would contact me!

Okay, so now I waited impatiently to hear from someone. Eventually I did manage to make an appointment to see a doctor at the surgery because I felt I could not wait any longer. It was later that week that I finally got a letter from the surgery asking me to make an appointment! This was now about five weeks after the blood tests at Moorfields. It will not surprise anything that I spent those weeks worrying that nothing was being done to rectify whatever was wrong with me and each morning I woke scared that I would find a problem in my other eye, or that I would have suffered a stoke or heart attack!

I saw another new doctor, nice woman but of course she didn't know me nor my medical history so although she acknowledged that the cholesterol levels shown in the hospital's blood test were very high (and probably the cause of my eye problem - I think) that she still wanted me to have another blood test to confirm the results. Whilst I could see her point, I also realised with some dismay that there would likely be another three week delay in starting the treatment she spoke about!

The next (early morning) fasting blood test appointment was not for two weeks! Not surprisingly I just asked for the quickest possible no matter what the time was! I still had to wait five days (that Friday). I was therefore somewhat surprised when, the following Tuesday I got a phone call from another doctor at the surgery who began by saying the results had been received and she thought that as the levels were quite high, she should speak to me with a view to seeing me. Not surprisingly I knew what this was about and told her I was free that day! At last I felt I might be getting somewhere.

The test results from Moorefield's had shown my Cholesterol levels to be at 10.2 (above 5 is considered not good!) These latest results showed the levels were now at 10.3. I cannot tell you how relieved I was that I was at last going to be taking some action to get myself better and that although there was always the chance of a heart attack or stroke that the immenecy would decrease if I were on the right medication!

This last doctor also wanted me to see a specalist cholesterol doctor at the local hospital and arranged for an appointment. Unsurpringly this also took some weeks, but I was far more relaxed about things now that I was finally talking pills to reduce my cholesterol levels. Still, I dutifully turned for the hospital appointment and saw another young female doctor. She didn't do or say much other than that she wanted me to return in 12 weeks and that I must have another blood test before and, so that she could discuss those results at our next appointment. She also wanted me to see a dietician and said she would arrange an appointment for me. I made the requisit appoitment for March 2010 and sat back to wait for the other appointment to turn up. Obviously I didn't know if I was going to just turn up or if I would be asked to keep an eating diary or something. Still, considering my experience to date, I decided to prempt things and keep a record of all the food, drink and exercise which I could then hand over and perhaps gets some better response and feedback to.

I had had to wait six weeks from starting the pills before I could have another blood test to see how things were progressing. This time I made an appointment with the same doctor (the one who had phoned me) at my surgery. I was very pleasantly surprised on this occasion to be told that my results were showing a definite improvement. My 10.3 cholesterol levels were now down to 4.5. My LDL cholesterol levels previously at 8.4 were down to 2.92 and for me, even more surprsingly I had lost a bit of weight! They could not tell me what Northwick Park Hospital had concluded after my visit, as they had not heard from them.

It was several weeks later that I recieved a letter from Northwick Park Hospital, informing me that my appointment had been cancelled! No reason, no explanation - nothing! I phoned to find out the reason, but no one knew and the doctor I had seen was away on holiday. I requested that she phone me with an explanation when she got back. Attached to this letter was a copy of another letter which I presumed was the one sent to my surgery. It was not an immediate thing, but within hours of receiving it, I did have an idea and checked the letter to see the address they had sent the letter to, and the date. I saw then that the surgery address was unknown to me and most definitely not my surgery!

I have done data entry and know that you complete forms online with the hard copy paperwork in front of you, so I couldn't see how (or why) the information had been entered incorrectly and not checked! I phoned them to inform them of their error and several days later received another copy which they sent to my surgery. Although they had the address correct, someone had inserted the name of 'my'doctor from some unknown location, and I had to phone the administration people again to explain that the 'named' doctor was not my doctor and was in fact, someone whom I didn't like and that they had to change it to the right person!

Several days after her return to work, the doctor from Northwick Park Hospital did phone me and she told me that she usually speaks to patients or leaves a message. I suggested to her that she had not spoken to me and with no answerphone, she had not left a message either! I assumed that she had been instructed to avoid admitting she had been at fault and in the end, I felt like I was just 'flogging a dead horse' trying to get her to admit she had been in error! However considering she had not phoned me, not left a message of explanation for me, nor had she written a note anywhere or included the reason for the cancellation on their letter to me, then I cannot see how she was not at fault!

Her explanation for the cancellation was that she had seen the blood results and decided she didn't need to see me and had consequently just discharged me! To me, I felt that it had taken her so long to arrange the appointment for the dietician and write the letter that I had had the blood tests and got the results back!

Maybe my annoyance at the errors and worry this caused me that I treated things as a bigger issue than others thought them to be. However I still feel that a) my surgery address should not have been input wrongly. b) my details should not have gone to the wrong surgery and perhaps if they had sent them back saying they had no patient by my name, their error would have been identified. (Had I not noticed it, no one would ever know). c) the hospital doctor should have had the curtesy to ensure I was aware of why my appointments were cancelled.

TRAVEL INSURANCE: Something I didn't realise until very recently is that when you take our insurance cover under the auspices of well known, and perhaps trusted companies, you may just be being led up the proverbial garden path. I took our travel insurance with Sainsbury's which I naevely thought would be good because it belong to 'Sainsbury's', a company who I frequently shopped in and whom I felt to be trustworthy. Unfortunately back in Sept 09 I was heading to Gatwick Airport for a four night break (anniversary present) in Las Vegas via a Virgin Atlantic holiday package. We ended up sitting around the airport from about 8.30am until around 3pm at which point we were informed the flight was being delayed until the following day.

We were put up at the nearest hotel, even though unfortunately we got 'lost' and the hotel didn't know where we were when our daughter turned up and they phoned the room they had us supposedly in, and it turned out to be strangers and she spent an hour hanging around whilst the reception staff tried to find us!

The next morning we had to make our way back to the departure lounge (we had to collect our luggage and check ourselves in for the new flight the night before) and we eventually took off 22 hours later than expected. Virgin had insisted all claims relating to the delay would have to go through our insurance companies and their gesture of apology was some air miles - which I didn't find very satisfactory because I don't travel often and therefore wouldn't get enough to be of any use!) Upon our return to the UK we discovered that Virgin were still not interested in accepting any responsibility and still would only offer us the airmiles. Our travel insurance company turned out to be FirstAssist who were also very reluctant to be of any help and confused the life out of me when they sent us £30 each by way of compensation for the delay, based on just a 12 hour delay. I think, you have to have tranches of at least 12 hours in order to qualify for anything but basic compensation and of course, we were 'officially' still two hours short of 24 hours! Cute trick that.

I had expected to deal with Sainsbury's Travel Insurance, but in fact the only thing they have to do with the insurance is their name! As far as I can gather, there is absolutely no contact with anyone from Sainsbury's and everything is handled by other parties. I received confirmation that the £30 compensation offered ' had been agreed', but could not understand who had agreed to it - because it certainly wasn't me!!

I was contacted by a woman called Amanda Henderson and I cannot tell you how many emails I sent her to ask her who she worked for. Was it Sainsbury's? Was it FirstAssist? Was it another company that was mentioned in communications I had had, called Cunningham Lindsey? I am still not absolutely sure but I suspect that FirstAssist and Cunningham Lindsey had 'chatted amongst themselves' and agreed the payment and basically that was all there was to it. Mind you, I was told that FirstAssist, who run the insurance for Sainsbury's also have the same arrangement with other large companies. So before you accept insurance cover, it might be worth delving into who is actually going to be dealing with things if you need to make a claim. It might surprise you and make you think twice!

So it turns out that the lost of one quarter of my holiday is irrelevant to, well everyone but me! I tried to suggest that a 22 h our delay is a whole waking day - but again, no one is interested. Now what I am trying to find out, which has still not been anwered by either the holiday company, the airline, the insurance company or anyone else is, who is liable to refund to us the cost of the lost night's accommodation we paid for in Last Vegas for that first night! So far, Virgin have ignored me and my communication past the point when they admitted they will only offer us the air miles. The insurance company insist that it will be the airline or the holiday company (especially as it would be the same company). ATOL apologied but said they cannot help as Virgin is not a member and that they would come under the auspices of ABTA.

I wrote to ABTA, who wrote back (with a standard letter - from a department rather than any individual in that department!) asking me to send details, paperwork etc. I then received another letter the next day informing me that ABTA cannot help as they do not deal with airlines. Okay, so perhaps I was at fault referring to the holiday company as 'Virgin Atlantic', although in fairness to me, I did think that the holiday company we booked with were called 'Virgin Atlantic holidays'. It has been a bit like hiting your head against a brick wall so far!

What the outcome is going to be, I cannot say but thanks to this experience, I don't ever want to take a short break holiday again, especially travelling so far!