No hospital bed

Well I think you've ALL got a flaming cheek complaining about this!

Which hospital is it? It’s not necessary just bad management. Last thing she needs. Hope she recovers quick and gets home !

*They're just overrun with people, I think.
Too many of us, too few beds.*

Yes, because the Tories have decimated our NHS.

Littleannie, I am so sorry to hear of your stepdaughter's experience. I do hope that her discomfort and distress is short-lived and that by morning she is settled in her bed on a ward. I feel for your frustration and sense of helplessness in this sort of situation - I have been there myself on behalf of my husband many times in the last year. for you and your stepdaughter.

There is some helpful advice amongst the posts in this thread, but I hope that the arguing and politicking between posters and occasional implicit criticism of the OP is not adding to her distress at this very stressful time.

Buster I totally disagree. Our hospital is in an area with a big immigrant population and has its share of immigrant staff. They come from all over the world, are perfectly fluent in English and are hard working, friendly and sympathetic. DH was never the easiest patient but they were unfailingly lovely with him.

As some one else said, recovery doesnt necessarily mean trolly.

There can be hospital beds in recovery

But in hospital speak "no bed" means no bed space on a ward. Not no actual bed.

About 18 months ago I went into hospital for day surgery, although I was told to bring an overnight bag because of the nature of the op I would be kept in overnight. After admission and pre op procedures someone from theatre came for me and I walked to operating theatre with him and climbed onto the operating table myself. That was an eye opener, as previous operations I had involved pre meds and being wheeled to theatre in my bed.
I awoke in the recovery ward in an actual bed. Whether I had been wheeled to recovery on a trolley and then transferred to a bed or if they had brought an actual bed to bring me back in I don't know. Everyone in recovery seemed to be in a proper bed. Around two hours later two nurses moved my bed to another area of the same recovery ward which was curtained off from where I previously was. A little while later the surgeon came to speak to me about my op, and then said unfortunately the ward you should be going to has no available beds so we have opened a temporary ward upstairs where you will be going to. This was a very large ward screened off for male and female areas, all having had day surgery of some description that day. We were looked after very well by all the staff and nothing was too much trouble.

Buster you are completely wrong. Out of hospital yesterday, all staff both from here and abroad were lovely and I mean from top to bottom were professional, rushed off their feet but maintained the kindest manner possible. NO language problem. Sad to say recurrent heart problem but ambulance took over an hour to arrive. I phoned again as I was on my own and the line was busy, yes 999, and I got a recorded message to say I was in a queue. That nearly broke me. Ambulance couldn't put heating on and it was very cold in the small hours. I blame this and previous Conservative and coalition governments. On hold for a 999 call? Not the first time either. This should never happen.

marjgran ??

BusterTank you are wrong on so many points that I despair. There are “lazy” nurses - I have met them - but they are despised by their colleagues and usually “home grown”, and most of us are “immigrants” in part at least. And those Brits abroad in Europe have the same treatment as locals, they do not have to go “private”. My experience of recovery was that I was in my own bed, and my delays were about stabilising me, but I may have been lucky. And my anaesthetists were both “immigrants”, so were half the nurses and all the cleaning staff, mostly EU.....

I am hoping when you go to see her tomorrow she will be back in the ward recovering.

Standard practice to have to sometimes wait hours for treatment or meds, a bed, or to be seen, I think.
Because there are also lots of other people waiting..

Once I was discharged after an operation and had to wait 6 hours to get my medication to take home with me because the labelling machine had broken down! I was bed blocking alright!
In the end, one of the nurses got so fed up, she said “Leave it to me!” and went down to the pharmacy, gave them a piece of her mind and came back with my prescription! Why can’t they just give you a prescription to take home and pick up from your local pharmacy?
This was a few years ago, but a couple of weeks ago, I was sent to the GP referral unit with loss of hearing, which ENT sorted out and then gave me a prescription for steroids, which they sent to the pharmacy electronically.
We went to have a coffee while the pharmacy was making it up, and when we arrived at the pharmacy about half an hour later, thinking it would be ready, they told us that they don’t actually start making up the prescription until you arrive in person at the pharmacy even though the prescription was sent electronically. If anyone in ENT had told us this, obviously, we would have checked in at the pharmacy before having a coffee. In the end we waited one and a half hours just to collect the prescription and missed our bus home!
There seems to be a big lack of common sense and communication going on in the NHS, which is easily avoidable.
I have plenty of experience of being looked after by foreign nurses, and have always found them to be charming and hard-working and have no complaints about them at all, Buster. What a sweeping statement!The NHS would collapse without them!

I think that anyone encouraging this woman to sue the hospital, demand to see the CEO or threaten to go to the papers, needs to wind their necks in.
Those actions are bang out of order unless it's proved to have had a detrimental effect in the patient.
How does the OP know for a fact that her SD is on a 'hard trolley' when no visitors are allowed into recovery?
Perhaps the OP would enlighten us on that point.
In most hospitals you are taken (either walking or in your bed) to the area where the anaesthetic is administered after you move or are moved to an operating 'table' which is then wheeled into theatre.
Post op you are moved to recovery in a bed in a bay, usually the one you were originally in as your belongings would be in the bedside cupboard.
If your condition warrants going to a ward after recovery, they have to wait for an empty bed.
It isn't the fault of nursing staff if the number of ops scheduled for surgery exceeds the number of free beds available to receive those patients after surgery.
Patients who need to be 'collected' cannot be discharged until the relative or friend has arrived so the bed cannot be used.
All hospitals have, 'broadly speaking', the same methods.

Oh Buster wake up if you’re one of the shortsighted people who think there are too many migrants here I can assure you annies step daughter will probably wait far longer after Brexit when all the European drs nurses and carers return and leave our hospitals How dare you judge the foreign staff are lazy that is a a totally unacceptable judgement and you should be ashamed to say that
Annie I m wondering how you know she’s been on a ‘hard’ trolly for 12 hours as you say no visitors are allowed in recovery if you are really dissatisfied with her treatment and have got your facts correct please contact PALS they are very helpful as mediators But from my own point of view I d rather her had the op and be on a hard bed than be put off and have to wait for the operation
I hope the rest of her recovery goes well

When I last went to A and E my local hospital was closed for emergencies. The next hospital had a que of ambulances 14 deep!
I was then on a trolley drips, sick, meds, exhausted and in pain etc all done in a busy corridor - 18 hours I was there. 9 am a bed was found finally and A and E was virtually cleared. Lots of empty beds on the ward I was on so why were so many of us left in A and E?

My surgery was cancelled three times over the following year. Leaving me constantly vomiting bile. I couldn’t even take the kids to school.

There’s an awful lot of admin, directors, faffing, and time wasted plus a lack of funds and essential resources, bed blocking too.
A complete overhaul is needed. With a sense of urgency.

Exactly jo. Also the costs the NHS bear because patients have to stay in hospital because of lack of social care provision, caused by swingeing cuts to la funding since 2010

The problem with NHS funding is not simply about increases in real terms, which the above article shows, but the fact that in recent years more treatments have been developed many of which are very expensive, so although funding has increased year on year, costs have increased even more. In addition because of all these expensive new treatments being available, peoples expectations have increased. We are not comparing like for like!

Littleannie

It's understandable that you can 't go into the Recovery Room. I've been in recovery room three times over past three years. It's not the room for visitors. Sorry.

However, stay in the hospital to keep asking. Is she comfortable now?

Buster you are completely wrong
www.health.org.uk/chart/chart-how-funding-for-the-nhs-in-the-uk-has-changed-over-a-rolling-ten-year-period

To an extent that’s true Rosina but I have worked for the NHS for 26 years now and the waste and inefficiency is staggering. We need a complete rethink about how it’s structured and where the funding goes (are whole corridors of £60k pa organisational development managers really needed, for example?) before we start increasing taxes and throwing good money after bad.

This is not ideal but what is to be done when hospitals are so short of space and staff have to do their best for everyone? I feel sympathy as they no doubt have to deal with complaints when they are doing their best with what they have.
On our local news some time ago people in the street were questioned about the state of the NHS; most complained of similar situations to the one described by the OP, but when asked if they would pay higher NI contributions, there seemed to be a general reluctance. The sad truth is we can have anything we want - if we pay for it. None of this helps that poor lady lying in recovery for all those hours though - I wish her well and hope she is more comfortable soon.

Ask to see the Chief Exec of the hospital pronto. If there is any kind of unwillingness to get them on site now, just tell whoever you are dealing with you will contact newspapers, MP. You have to push or else you will just be shoved! No point being nice, this should not have happened. Inspite of way SD is being treated do hope she has a good recovery.

I’m so sorry to hear that littleannie and regardless of the hardness or type of trolley or the reasons for why she isn’t now in a hospital bed, it sounds like she’s having a very unpleasant time when she’s vulnerable and in pain.

I hope things are better for her today

What you need to do, is take great care considering who to vote for. This is purely political, it is due to massive cuts in the number of hospital beds available. I do hope your loved one makes a full recovery.