First Aid Advice

Last Friday, 4 January, I posted about my daughter getting toothache essence in her eye. The headline in the local newspaper, the Folkestone Herald, was about a lady who called for medical help for her dying husband and the Emergency after hours doctor turned up 13 hours later. She was, understandably, very upset.

I am still seething about the runaround I got when trying to get some advice on how to deal with Caelyn, so I wrote a letter to the Herald. I doubt that they will print it, so I am going to post it here:

Folkestone Herald Letters

Sir

I was sad to read your cover story this week of Mrs Helen who had to wait for 13 hrs for a doctor to visit her dying husband.

I have a health annoyance too. Last Friday night 4 January, my married daughter who lives in Dover got oil of cloves – toothache essence – in her eye. Her husband called me and I told him to keep flooding the eye with water while I found out more specific treatment.

I thought of calling 999, but it was not a life-threatening emergency. All I wanted was urgent first aid advice, and no one would give it to me.

I called William Harvey A & E and was told they were not allowed to put calls through to staff from the public. They suggested NHS Direct, but they take forever to answer their calls and I did not know how corrosive toothache essence was or was not and I was worried about irreversible damage to the eye, so I phoned the out of hours GP service.

The woman who answered was annoyed with me and was quite rude because I did not want to waste time answering her questions about name, date of birth, address, postcode, usual GP etc. Her impatience, irritation and determination to stick to her “script” was extremely unhelpful and upset me a lot. Why would a person in that sort of job be incapable of understanding the dangers of strong chemicals in eyes and using her discretion?

When I realised that she would not help until she had the whole “pedigree”, I answered her questions, frantically worrying about my daughter’s eyesight. She then told me I should not have called her, that I should call Stour Care.

In the end, I looked it up on the Internet, and the treatment I had instructed her husband to give her was the right treatment. It might not have been, though, and seconds are very precious when a chemical is in someone’s eye.

What do people do if they do not have Internet access?