Awful A&E / urgent care experience
After calling 111 and being advised by the out of hours GP who called me back to attend A&E, I arrived at QE A&E at 5.30pm on Easter Sunday. Certainly not where I wanted to be on Easter Sunday but I wouldn't have gone had I not been feeling so desperately unwell. Standing in the entrance to A&E was a nurse stood with her arms folded, a security guard and a second nurse sat on chair. I asked if I was at the correct entrance and the nurse stood with her arms folded walked towards me a held the door open a jar and said 'why are you here?' I informed her I'd advised to attend by the out of hours GP at Katie Road, Selly Oak. She asked 'why' with the most appalled and inconvenienced look and I informed her I'd been experiencing dizziness, temperature and sweats, pains in my legs and arms and the out of hours GP suspects I have an infection, given some other recent medical events. The nurse then open the door further and said 'come here' and pointed to a chair. She then took my blood pressure, whilst still in the entrance of the A&E. She didn't advised me either way as to my blood pressure but rolled her eyes, looked over the nurse sat down and said 'she said she's been told to come here by out of hours'. The nurse who was sitting down said 'have they given you a letter' to which I said no as I was directed here by the out of hours over the telephone and both nurses just glared at each other. The one handed me and piece of paper and said 'out there second door on the right'. I stood up, struggling to balance due to dizziness, took the piece of paper and began to walk down to where I'd been directed. I don't actually have any previous comparable experience, but why is turning up to A&E, following direction from out of hours services, met with such inconvenience and distain? Just over 24hrs on and I cannot stop thinking about the look on the faces of the nurses at my sheer existence. I felt so desperately unwell, yet walked away feeling so deeply embarrassed to have even dared to turn up. No way on God's earth would my choice ever be to go to A&E, never mind go on an Easter Sunday. I called 111 because I'd tried to self care at home for 2 days, taking paracetamol and ibuprofen and was becoming increasingly more unwell. I turned up expecting to have to wait a long time and had no expectation of this being seen straight away but one thing I didn't expect was just how utterly rude, dismissive and visible put out by my arrival the group of gatekeepers at the door would be. When I went through the other entrance with my piece of paper I was met by a security guard who then asked me why I was here and where I got the piece of paper from. After justifying my intrusion for a second time, I was directed through to a waiting area. Once called through by the doctor, he took me through, sat me down, held his hands out and said 'why are you here, why have you come to A&E on a sunday'. At this point I began to cry, I just said 'out of hours told me to come'. The doctor took my blood pressure etc and told me that I'm experiencing these symptoms because of ear wax and I need to contact my GP to arrange to get them cleaned and I don't appear to have the type of infection I was initially concerned about. I write this experience, whilst I lay as an inpatient at Heartlands Hospital, currently receiving IV antibiotics for quite a serious infection. I didn't quite make it home to my front door after I left the QE yesterday. I ended up passing out at the bottom of my road and was brought here by a neighbour, thankfully.