January 28, 2008

I’ve been having a bit of a rough time with the pemphie.  It has flared up again and again.  No sooner does it start to disappear and I being to heal, it comes back, and always a little bit worse than the time before.

I was last at the hospital at the end of August and was supposed to return after two months.  I was eventually given an appointment at the end of November but couldn’t attend because I was away.  I let the hospital know in plenty time that I wouldn’t be able to make the November appointment.  And since then I’ve heard nothing.  I have made several phone calls to the Dermatology department and have repeatedly been fobbed off and told that I’ll be sent an appointment in due course.  I’ve even asked if it would be possible just to speak to a consultant and was told no.  As I understood it, the delay was because I was allocated a locum consultant who only visited when there were sufficient numbers of appointments ‘collected’.

Today,  I saw my GP.  He was fantastic and immediately phoned Dermatology to find out what the hell was going on.  I could only hear one end of the conversation, but they clearly began by trying to fob him off too, but he persisted and pointed out that I didn’t have a ‘minor skin condition’, and that my illness is a serious, chronic one.  Eventually, he got to the truth of the matter: the locum has left and all patients allocated to him have been abandoned!  No one thought to tell me or my GP (or presumably any of the locum’s other patients).  My GP was clearly angry.  So, now he has to re-refer me.  the whole situation is ridiculous and deeply worrying.  What on earth does NHS Grampian think it is doing?!?  I think I might write a letter to my MSP (Mike Rumbles), because although I’m being re-referred it’s only because my GP and I were both persistent, others might easily fall through the cracks and be forgotten about.