Final Update From Grandad

[Grandad]

Just to conclude what has been happening in my life for the last week or so, finally my failing eyes
I had an eye appointment at the glaucoma clinic last Saturday. Did a visual field and then saw an Italian doctor. She looked at the VF plots and for the right eye she imitated cutting her throat and said 'Kaput'. I know it is 'Kaput' but she could have put it more sympathetically but I did detect a limited English vocabulary and she had a very strong accent such that I kept asking her to repeat what she said.
Moving to the left eye plot she sad there is more 'black' there, meaning an increase in the dead cells. With my right eye I just have some vision on the extreme right periphery, although this is not useful vision. I now realise that the increasing loss in the left eye is in the right periphery because I can no longer see my nose. And I have a generous conk.

I am always the first to defend our NHS not least because of the various first class treatments both my wife and I have received. The Saturday clinic was described as an emergency clinic put on to catch up with a backlog of eye appointments.
The nurse who did my VA and pressures had been drafted in for the day from Ilford in Essex. There were two ladies doing the VF checks and I learned that they had traveled down Friday evening, overnight stay in a hotel, work just the Saturday shift then overnight again in an hotel before returning to MANCHESTER on Sunday. Talking to another nurse she said it is most likely that the doctor was actually flown in from Italy to do that days work. And there were two other doctors on duty who I had never seen before so, who knows, they may also have been drafted in from goodness knows where. I have heard that these short assignments cost anything up to £4000 per day plus expenses.
Little wonder the NHS is short of funds, it is also short of good management.

[LovelyLadyLux]

@Grandad What you're describing is how both our medical and legal fields are operating. Doctors (particularly specialists) and Judges are flown in or ferried in weekly for specific appointments. There are not nearly enough regular Family Doctors to meet the need nor do we have enough Judges to hear all the legal cases. They come over seemingly at random from the Mainland will tackle what is in front of them then return. There is minimal 'continuity of care' and this definitely impacts people who would benefit from somebody who actually follows their case and who kinda knows what is going on vs having to scour a file for each new person. The cost to this type of care of horrendous to us taxpayers.

[FABlux]

Sorry to hear your eyesight is getting worse.

I am surprised they don't make more use of the private sector. Barry still goes to Optegra in the UK as our region of France is like the UK & has a shortage of opthalmic specialists. Our GP said for some reason as people are retiring they are finding difficulty replacing them as less young doctors are choosing that speciality

The last couple of times he was in Optegra, i.e. over the last 2 years as he goes annually, they have had NHS patients in there as well. 2 had even come from Sussex/Kent to Hampshire because they said their own area had such a long waiting list they were sending them to private clinics for eye surgery. It would seem a lot more cost effective than the lengths your region is going to as they give the NHS a special rate.