The NHS: When a Child's Welfare is no longer of Paramount Concern...

Time for my First Proper Rant..... ;)

And where better to begin than the NHS!!!! Oh dear... Here goes! Lol

So Lexi is severely pigeon-toed so I took her to the doctors in August 2010 for the doctor to assess whether she needed any treatment or physiotherapy for this. The doctor advised me she would "grow out of it so ignore it". Well it was easy enough to ignore the fact that she walked slightly bow legged and when she wasn't concentrating the pigeon in-toeing was quite prominent: but what happened (repeatedly!!) next was not so easy to ignore!! When she tripped over her own feet a few times and each time managed to bang her head; whether it be on the door frame or the coffee table or just a toy; it was always her head, I had had enough. Subsequently she was in Minor Injuries at our local hospital goodness knows how many times!

Well as you can imagine, I had had enough of this as the poor little mite was getting anxious and was worried to run or walk quickly as she would trip and fall. So on 28 October 2010 I went to my doctor and demanded that I get a second opinion or that Lexi be looked at by a Physiotherapist. The doctor said he would refer her immediately to the Child's Physiotherapist at the main hospital in Cornwall, Treliske!

When by January 2011 I had still not heard anything from the Therapy Department, and being quite a forceful person ;), I phoned 6 times (keeping careful logs of all calls), wrote to them repeatedly (which I kept copies of) and emailed them (which I also kept) asking what on earth was going on as Lexi was injuring herself more and more frequently and we were still no further forward and hadn't even had a consultation. The curt response I got on the telephone was that "Treliske Therapy Department is very, very busy. There is a waiting list time of at least 8 months so just pipe down and wait. Lexi will be seen in August 2011"!!! Well...... I hit the roof! Lol. I phoned Management, I phoned my Doctor, I phoned the Health Committee, I phoned and wrote to just about everybody I could think of to try and help with this abomination. Lack of staff should not mean a child's welfare be neglected!!!

Low and behold, in February an appointment comes through the post saying Lexi had been upgraded to "urgent" and could be seen immediately. Funny how they couldn't fit her in before right?!

So along I go and saw a lovely Physio who explained that they didn't have enough money for staff which was why we had had to wait so long as they only had 2 part-time physios when Treliske's demand was actually for 4 full-time physios or more!!!

Anyway, Lexi's feet were assessed as being severe and that she would need some specialised shoes to hold her feet in place to ensure that the in-toeing didn't deteriorate as she got older. Those shoes arrived THREE WEEKS later and were too small (probably because we'd been waiting a bloody month for them to come!!!). So another set of shoes were ordered; I went in to collect those (paying £4.40 per time to park at the Hospital) and what a surprise, those didn't fit as we had waited three weeks for those to arrived too! This is now 6 weeks after our appointment. So the Physio says "We will try some night-time splint shoes as her feet are obviously not right for daytime shoes". By not "right" what she actually meant was that Lexi has what they assessed as narrow feet and their shoes only come in one width which is too wide. I would like to point out though that whenever having Lexi's feet measured at a reputable children's shoe shop like Clarks, they always assess her feet as being wider than average with her needing a G width fitting! So somebody is wrong and I very much doubt it is Clarks! Lol.

So the Physio measures Lexi's feet - 14cm. The biggest they do the night-time splint is 13.5cm. "Oh well" says the Physio "Let's order them anyway"!! So along we go AGAIN THREE WEEKS LATER, to try on Lexi's evening splint. And as I already expected, they were too small! Grrrrrrrrrrr. OK says the Physio, we will order her some trainers as they may fit her better.

Whilst at this appointment (to which I took my Husband because he thought I was joking about all this nonsense going on) we were told that actually Lexi's condition isn't too bad and MIGHT right itself by the time she is 8. Well thank you very bloody much! Either you have just wasted 7 months of our lives worrying about it and fretting to try and get it sorted; or you are now lying to cover the fact that you are not able to do your job properly and help Lexi to stop injuring herself!! Either way I am FURIOUS!!!

So anyway, the trainers were ordered at the end of April. It is now 10th May 2011 and I have just contacted them to be told that the shoes aren't "available" but can we come in on Friday 13th May for an appointment for them to try some other shoes on Lexi.

So after being referred on 28 October 2010....
To being marked as Urgent in January 2011....
It is now MAY 2011 and Lexi is still no further forward.

Is it just me or is this just plain incompetence and complete lack of the "care" a Hospital is supposed to give? Thank you very much Treliske Hospital for not being bothered to give the correct care and treatment to our 21 month old daughter. This won't be the last in this saga, I'm sure!!! The lovely lady at our local Minor Injuries has even telephoned the Therapy Department personally to complain about the lack of care Lexi is being given and the complete negligence the Therapy Department are bestowing on our baby girl!

Thank you for listening to me rant but as you can see, I am a little frustrated! But when it comes to the welfare of children and incompetence leading to neglect of duty and care, I do tend to get rather irate! :(