No matter how much extra money for the NHS was pledged in yesterday’s Scottish budget, it is unlikely to help the immediate crisis in Grampian.
Thousands of pensioners like me are afraid to set foot outside during frosty weather lest we fall and face the nightmare of being stuck in agony in a queue of ambulances outside ARI.
A couple of friends who’ve spent months in pain and finally been put on the list for new hips face a wait of 48 weeks. Others I know have waited longer than the upper limit of 62 days for treatment for suspected cancer. The situation is not only heartbreaking but quite scandalous.
The recent so-called “critical incident” says it all when patients were turned away from Forresterhill to be sent to Inverness or Dundee.
Now it’s been revealed that a group of senior clinicians alerted Grampian NHS bosses to the “intolerable” risk level three months ago.
They complained that not enough was being done to meet the expected increase in demand over the winter. The medical and unscheduled care team not only feared for patients but also for their staff facing ever-increasing workloads.
Yet nothing seemed to have been done in an attempt to avert the oncoming crisis.
Aberdeen has a proud history of medical care with the infirmary known throughout the world as a flagship centre for health. Yet now most of its waiting lists and timetables for seeing consultants are the worst in Scotland.
Little wonder so many people – especially those poor folk facing the stress of long waits for consultations and treatments – want to know why this sickening decline in standards has happened. Who can we blame? Bad management by Grampian NHS Trust? Being starved of cash by Holyrood? Or both?
Moreen Simpson is a former assistant editor of the Evening Express and The Press and Journal and started her journalism career in 1970.
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