A mother has described the “absolute carnage” inside the A&E department at Wales’ biggest hospital after her daughter was left suffering from a fit in the waiting room in plain view of other patients. The woman, who preferred to remain anonymous, took her daughter, who has epilepsy, to the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff on Saturday evening (January 4).
Her daughter has suffered with epilepsy and other health conditions since she was born, and due to her medical history is always fast tracked to receive urgent care upon arrival at a hospital. However, that did not happen on Saturday evening and she was left “actively fitting” in front of waiting crowds.
“It was an absolute disaster,” said the patient’s mother. “She has medications at home and if they don’t work we have to go in (to A&E), so we drove to the hospital at about 6pm on Saturday because you either drive there yourself in 10 minutes or you wait however long it takes for an ambulance to arrive.” For the latest Welsh news delivered to your inbox sign up to our newsletter.
The woman added: “Normally when we go in we report to the desk and go straight into the resuscitation ward because we have a care plan in place which highlights to staff what is needed, but last night we had to wait in the waiting room and it was absolute carnage. All the staff were running around like headless chickens and I felt so sorry for them, while we sat with someone having a fit.”
Eventually, after about 25 minutes of panic, the patient was taken through to the resuscitation ward. Worryingly, the patient’s mother said the A&E waiting room wasn’t at full capacity on Saturday evening and that she has seen it far worse. “That’s what worries me – what would it have been like if it was fully packed?” she added. “There’s no doctors, no nurses, there’s sinks hanging off the wall, some of the toilets don’t work, and there’s patients being cared for overnight in chairs. There seems to be no funding at all. It’s absolutely shocking.
“How the Welsh Government has the audacity to say we need 36 new MSs (members of Senedd) I don’t know. What we have is not even third world healthcare at times.” The woman added that she and her daughter returned home later on Saturday night because there were no beds available for her to stay at the hospital. “She’s not very well at all,” she said. “It’s more a case of when are we going to have to go back next?”
If you have experienced any difficulties in A&E departments or hospitals in Wales, please get in touch with us at newsdesk@walesonline.co.uk, or via Facebook.
Cardiff and Vale University Health Board has been asked to comment on what happened at the University Hospital of Wales on Saturday evening, and on the claims made about the current state of care and facilities at the hospital. A spokesman for the Welsh Government said: “We are sorry to hear about this family’s experience. Our expectation is that people who need of urgent or emergency care are signposted to the right place, first time and receive the best possible care based on their needs.
“Health and social care services are under significant pressure across the UK at present, as a consequence of increased cases of flu and other respiratory viruses. We are working closely with NHS and social care partners to ensure people receive the best possible care at this time and urge people to take up the offer of flu vaccination.”
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