hospital wheelchairs

Awful filly for both of you.

Once when Mum was in hospital, DS1 came to visit her in his wheelchair but left it parked just outside the ward - big mistake! We came out to find that his bran new £800 wheelchair was gone. We couldn't find it anywhere and were just on our way home thinking we'd have to buy a new one, when I spotted a man, with a drip on a stand, smoking a cigarette, sitting in Matt's chair.

He had taken it thinking it was hospital issue (or so he said) despite the fact that it only has one foot rest and it racing green.

Oh poor you, filly You have my heartfelt sympathy. it is so hard when you are responsible for somebody else too I can imagine how awful it was and truly hope this never happens again.

I'm afraid this is a common and very distressing situation. I've found it in half a dozen large hospitals in different cities when chauffeuring various elderly, disabled relatives and friends to appointments. What you can do is arrange for the patient to be collected by ambulance and arrange to meet them at the clinic. Lie about the availability of a car and driver. Only problem here is the hours sitting about waiting to be taken home and often the tour of your local area on the way.

The best thing to do in these circumstances is to park as near to an entrance as you can then speak to a member of staff who can call a porter with a wheel chair to whichever entrance you are at. You may have to wait while a porter plus chair gets to you but they will eventually. Hospital wheelchairs are never in the right place at the right time , the porters usually keep a store of chairs near their cubby hole to use for this eventuallity.

Our hospital has the same problem. When the new hospital was opened they were issued with plenty - but people stole them. Now they have big angular chairs with five foot poles stuck on them like dodgem cars, but still there are never enough. Rather than drop mum off and leave her alone while I attempted to find somewhere to park we bought her her own chair. We tried to borrow a Red Cross one - but there was a waiting list.

My gripe is the parking. Yellow lines, disabled spaces, are all ignored as people leave their cars everywhere and anywhere leaving the smallest gaps for access.

It's a new hospital for Pete's sake and was built with fewer beds than the old one despite the fast growing population.