Our Nightmare Weekend

As you all start preparing for your weekends, please let me tell you our story. 
This time last Friday my beautiful little man suffered his first anaphylactic reaction of the weekend. He was first assessed and treated by amazing paramedics (including one who managed to get a cannula in to a 3 year old’s veins whilst in the back of an ambulance speeding down Tottenham Court Road), then taken straight through to resuscitation before going to paediatric A&E and then spending the night on the paediatric ward. The same thing happened to us again after discharge on the Saturday. 

Our nightmare weekend started on Friday evening and ended on Sunday lunchtime; trust me when I tell you how unsocial these hours felt to me, let alone to the people working their shifts. During this time we were treated (because, yes, they looked after me just as much as him) by paramedics, consultants, registrars, junior doctors, nurses and student nurses, not to mention the porters, domestics and countless other people involved in hospital care. We experienced expert care, amazing treatment, and outstanding compassion. 

I have worked for the NHS for the last ten years (as well as 3 years previous as a student) and I know how hard we work. I know what is it like to be there at someone’s first breath and to hold someone’s hand at their last. I know what it is like to miss Christmases and birthdays (and countless family dinners). I have done 12 1/2 hour shifts with no time to eat, drink or pee. 

So Jeremy Hunt, I dare you to look at the story of how the NHS saved my son’s life (at a weekend) and the story of my working life and say that the doctors are “greedy”, that the paramedics are “ambulance drivers” and the student nurses don’t deserve a bursary. In fact, I challenge you to look me in the eye and tell me that the NHS is not worth fighting for.

#JuniorContract #NotFair #NotSafe #BursaryOrBust