All this hospital visiting has taken me back to a bygone age! One where you need money...Not cheques or bank cards but actual cash! I parted with £50 on the night I took a taxi home from the hospital and have not been near any cash points since........this I have to try to put right soon. People need paying!
All attempts at using hospital facilities have so far failed. If you ring the number given for a direct line to the bedside you get a recorded message which goes on for so long that I chopped it off in its prime. I don't need to know how much it's all going to cost me....I just want to speak to David!
I am so used to sending text messages and e mails now that going back to snail mail is something of a shock! He needs to speak to me every morning to list all the essential ingredients needed to get him through the day! I left him my old iPhone so that he needn't feel cut off. I use it as a pay as you go now and know there's minutes left on it. That got blocked and I think it's because it's two years since I last used it.
Trying to find ways through all the stuff on the screen above David's bed is even worse because they make it sound so easy...the sub clauses only kick in when you try. As for feeding it with your credit card you would need massive faith in the system to do that!
He has his tablet and his kindle and I take him his Times every morning!
He is still bored.....but bless him it's his first stay in hospital and I am praying that he'll be home soon.
God willing his small op should be tomorrow, sooner if he goes on shouting at the nurses!
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2 comments:
I think that these hospital systems prey on the vulnerable and are atrociously expensive. The hospitals have a vested interest in their use as they get a good cuts from the takings.
When Jen was in hospital for nearly a week earlier this year, the parking charges could well have bankrupted me, let alone buying coffee and tea in the Costa Coffee shop which is the only outlet for food and drink for visitors. And, Jen was offered three small cups of tea in 24 hours, so I was having to buy her large takeaway tea's several times a day at nearly £1 each :(
Luckily, we both have contract mobile phones with consecutive numbers, so in theory, she should have been able to speak to me easily, not so. The hospital banns the use of mobile phones on thew wards, and Jen was attached to various machines and on the third floor, half a mile (it felt) away from any outside are to phone from. All designed it seems to me to encourage the use of their contracted facilities.
When she was going to be sent out, she had to beg a nurse to ring me to come and collect her - rather than sit around for hours waiting for transport. At this time she couldn't walk more than 20 yards. The hospital said it wasn't their policy to let her use the phone in that way? "There are public phones you can use"!!!!
Luckily, I'd got up early and went there, well before visiting time and they said that she could come home, once her medication had come from pharmacy - 5 hours later it did.
You might say, appalling service, but given it's reputation, I think we got off likely.
This hospital is a mulitimillion pound hospital, built under PFI to replace two older hospitals in 1997. It's already failing along with others in the area.
Bah humbug
I do sympathise Ernie .....it's like getting caught up in a massive machine from which there is no escape! The hospital here is quite small by comparison with most and all of my dealings with it have been good....for the most part.....but the communications stuff drives me bananas!
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