The love/hate for the NHS

I absolutely love the NHS, specifically that I get great health care at no price. However, with socialized medicine there are some minor set backs, which, while minor, can really annoy the hell out of you.

Today, I went to the doctor to get put back onto the Anti-Coagulant clinic's roster as I "hadn't been attending" since I had been removed from blood thinners (b t dubs, I'm back on them for what looks like the rest of my life), and the only way is to have my doctor call in for me. I tell the receptionist at my local doctor's that I need to talk about my warfarin and INR as soon as possible with the doctor and she gives me an appointment for the following Friday (mind you this is a whole week away at the time). Fine, whatever.

I wait it out, and go to the doctor today only to get lectured that I should have come to them sooner, that my INR might dangerously high, and I could have to spend the night in the hospital hooked up to a Vitamin K drip. Sounds like a stellar Friday, right?

My doctor asks me to call back at 5 PM to find out what my INR levels are. I call, the receptionist tells me they will call me Monday. I try to explain that I have to talk to the doctor on call tonight as my doctor instructed me to do so, she tells me to call back Monday (as that MUST be what my doctor really meant). Finally, I tell her that I need to talk to him to see if I have to spend the night in the hospital and that it's a near emergency at this point. Finally, she puts me through. I'm fine. No hospital tonight!

I think my major problem is that I don't know the magic words to get around the receptionist. I think I'm saying things to express the urgency, but it doesn't seem to work, and in order to get an urgent appointment, I apparently need to convince her it's really important. If anyone has some tips, please let me know. I've tried warfarin, i've tried INR, I've tried "the doctor told me to call back at this time" and yet it doesn't seem to work. Grr.

Okay, that complaint was more about the receptionist than the NHS, but it's kind of the same problem that I have with the whole NHS. It's not that you have to wait so long for the appointments as most people think, it's the bureaucracy of it all. You have to walk through so much red tape (hence the "I HAVE to see the doctor to get onto the clinic's list again but then I get in trouble for not getting the INR checked earlier"), that it slows down the process.

Many people have asked me about the NHS and socialized medicine as it was a hot topic during the election. As I've put it, if I feel I need something done quickly (that isn't an emergency) I'll get it done when I'm in the States. However, when I spent a week in the hospital for my stroke, I didn't have to pay a dime! Or I guess a 10p. So really, I shouldn't complain so much, but it's bureaucracy that's so prevalant in every day life in the UK that drives me nuts some times.