After waiting almost 2 years to see an ENT [Ear Nose & Throat] specialist at my local hospital [with regard to issues with my right ear and associated feelings of nausea and vertigo] I was seen just twice [for a total of about 25 minutes] then fobbed off by some inexperienced understudy of my assigned doctor. 

Bastards!!!!! 

Now all they did was look in my ear with a scope thingy and do a CT scan.  That's it and I was told that they could see nothing wrong with my ear and told me I would no longer be seen by the department... that if I required further treatment I would need to see my GP.  That was the advice, but it felt more like "piss off we can't be bothered.  So what about a MRI?  Blood tests?  Biopsies?  Something?  Anything?  Nope, none of that... "Go see your GP if you have further problems" 

Like WTF?   She referred me in the first place because she believed I had ENT issues after I had explained my symptoms and experiences to her.... eg: pain and discomfort; crackling and popping; tinitus; swelling of my face and neck immediately adjacent to my ear; loss of hearing at various times; difficulties in swallowing with the swelling in ny neck, and no longer being able to fly anywhere because my ear pops violently [and at not very high altitude] and it seriously hurts for anything up to 2 weeks afterwards.

Now all this was in the referral letter, but I feel like it was largely ignored.  All I got was a tongue depressor and "say ah", a fechen light shone in my ear and "that's all clear" and a CT scan which isn't able to see everything.  There are other things a MRI would show, and in fact could have shown some abnormality or other, but no, "you're not dying and we won't spend the money on it because of the monetary squeeze... send in another patient of a fucked up health system disease." 

Bastards!!!!! 

If I had nothing wrong with my ear, would I have waited 2 fechen years to see and ENT?  No, you can bet yer sweet bippy I wouldn't have.  I got better things to do with my time than wait around a fechen hospital for hours on end.  My 1st appointment was for 1.15pm one Monday afternoon, and there was plenty of activity in the department - doctors room hopping and having conflabs with each other about various patients, etc - but I did not get into see my allocated doctor until 4.00pm. Now being I was supposed to have been 1st cab off the rank that day, it was a poor show to say the least.

Bastards!!!!! 

Yeah, sure, I'm gonna sign myself up for a 3 hour hospital wait when there's fech all is wrong with me.  What were you thinking?  Something along the lines of: "Let's piss this bloke off enough that he won't want to come bach for a second appointment."?  Fact is, I turned up for my 2nd appointment!  Why?  Cos truly, there's something fechen wrong with my fechen ear you fechen idiots.

What's worse, they closed the case and I'm back at square one.  Obviously, I will go to see my GP because nothing was resolved and my condition has since worsened, and again she will refer me to the local hospital because I fall within its zone and not another, but again I will be put on a list to be put on a waiting list and have to wait another year or two before I get to see anyone... and then I won't get a choice of doctor, so I could end up with the same bastard I got last time.... that somebody who obviously doesn't give a fech.

And there's no use me complaining, either.  During my second visit an elderly man - who was obviously upset with his treatment, or should I say lack thereof - was removed from the hospital by police and charged with disorderly conduct, affray and resisting arrest.  C'mon, resisting arrest, for fech sake?  The bloke was in his 80's and somewhat frail.  And Affray?  All he did was raise his voice when staff refused him treatment and wouldn't listen to his pleas.

Sadly, this is what has happened to our hospitals.  When staff simply can't be bothered with this or that patient, they call security guards and/or police to have them removed... irrespective of their state of health.  Not so long ago a mental patient was shot dead by police because he "raised his hands in the air" and "became unmanagable"

Bastards!!!!!!!

Not only is this a sad indictment on our hospital system, it's an indictment on those who see health care as a monetary thing rather than a humanitarian one.  Penny pinching has caused so much grief, pain and suffering. It has created a situation where public hospital patients can be arrested, charged and even killed by police for merely trying to stand up for themselves.... when the real crime is the betrayal of those people in need of treatment yet are refused.

So, if and when I get another appointment, which I expect will be some way off, will I bother to attend?  Seriously, I don't know that I will.  The penny pinching will not have ceased - if anything it'll be worse by the time they're ready to fob me off again - so there is a lot of doubt as to whether it would do me any good or not. I may be that I'll save myself the grief and stick with seeing my GP, whatever medication she can prescribe to ease my symptoms.