Voices: ‘I no longer recognise it’: Former staff and patients share experiences of the NHS

Public dissatisfaction with the NHS has reached record levels, sparking a passionate debate about the future of healthcare in the UK and what patients can reasonably expect from the service.

When we asked for your views, many Independent readers shared deeply personal and often distressing experiences of being let down by an overstretched and under-resourced system.

Common themes included poor access to GPs, long waits for hospital care, and essential services being cut without adequate communication. Some described surgeries reduced to little more than dispensaries, and a growing burden of travel for even the most routine care.

Others highlighted serious breakdowns in communication between hospitals and GPs, outdated technology, and a bureaucratic rigidity that fails to reflect individual needs. There were also moving testimonies from people who received timely, life-saving care and praised the professionalism and compassion of NHS staff – even under immense pressure.

But despite widespread frustration, most contributors expressed continued support for the founding principles of the NHS. Many agreed that the current problems stem not from the frontline workers, but from years of political neglect, underfunding, and systemic mismanagement.

Here’s what you had to say:

I live in rural Devon and my local GP service is part of a medical group 14 miles away. My surgery (½ a mile away) only has a GP there two days a week, and mostly you are told to go to the “main” surgery, which is a 28-mile round trip, and there is no bus to it. There are 20 GPs on the medical group’s website and I have never met or spoken to any of them. Now they are refusing to do hospital-ordered blood tests at either surgery, so this means I have the “choice” of going somewhere else between 28–78 miles round trip for blood tests that I will need regularly for the rest of my life.

My local surgery is now just a glorified pharmacy. You cannot get an appointment for weeks or even months. You used to go into the surgery and there would be a queue and people waiting to be seen, but now it’s like a ghost town. I have no choice but to be registered at this surgery as it is the only one I am in the catchment area for, but I want as little as possible to do with them after the way they have treated people like me needing blood tests. Callous disregard – that is all I receive from this surgery. As my conditions worsen and I get older, my world gets smaller, and yet I am expected to travel further and further for services that I should get in my own town.

ValB

I’ve been waiting over a year for sleep study results and a diagnosis. I have pain and chronic fatigue. I will be moving to another area in June and I’m not sure if I’ll have to start the process again. I feel I’ll be dead before I get seen!

Mx5

Last summer I fell over a pothole whilst crossing the road and seriously fractured my wrist. The irony is that although the state of the road was appalling, the treatment I received from the NHS was second to none. I was in an ambulance within 10 minutes, had major restorative surgery the next day and was home after 3 days. (The stay on the ward was another matter with too few staff having to deal with dementia patients who could not be discharged. Even so, they remained kind and polite despite the awful abuse they received from patients who should not have been in hospital.)

My post-operative appointments were well managed with very little excessive waiting, and the consultants shared X-rays and their analyses of the improvements with me in an adult-to-adult way. The second operation to remove the plate went ahead as scheduled and I recovered well, although I did have to seek private physiotherapy as timely appointments were just not available. I cannot fault the treatment I received. Having lived and worked abroad (USA) in the past, I shudder to think what such service would have cost me (or my insurer, if I even had one willing to pay out without quibble).

OK, perhaps I was just lucky, and I appreciate that many people do not have such timely and successful treatment. However, this was the first time in my life (and I am in my late 70s) that I have ever been admitted into hospital, and all I can say is that the interactions I had with ALL STAFF were thoroughly professional, and it was absolutely evident that at all times, my welfare was their primary concern. It is this ethos that is so important and significantly contributes to patient recovery. Despite the incredible demands that are made of them, the staff I encountered never fell short of this ideal.

MikeJW

I was talking to a care assistant yesterday. They had a resident needing urgent hospital admission on Saturday night. Eventually, the patient was prioritised (collect within two hours). To achieve this, the GP had to argue over the phone with the ambulance driver and the admissions nurse, who didn’t think (without seeing the patient) that it should be an admission. Madness!

DafB

What should we expect? On May 17 last year I was rushed to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital in critical condition. During the three weeks I stayed there, I received treatment that was, to say the least, satisfactory. It was sufficient to restore me to a healthier state. If we’re assisted when we need it most, does that meet an objective standard by which to measure universal health care?

Maybe I was lucky to get a lot more than that: the nursing staff provided genuinely kind attention. The doctors were engaged in my care and worked to find appropriate solutions, applying their expert judgement. The technicians were efficient and thoughtful. The contract staff also deserve a mention for their efforts. With only a few exceptions, the staff were friendly, considerate, dedicated, cheerful, and effective.

Does the low rating the NHS has received reflect more on the society of moaners and whiners we have become? Want to take the NHS away? Not from my dead, lifeless hands – which might have been the case under a privatised system that I could not afford. Keep greed at bay and the profit motive in its place. Those who want to make health care exclusively “user pays” are only interested in making a killing (pun intended).

SpineFilm

A massive influx of migrants over many years with no corresponding increase in infrastructure. Many European doctors and nurses left after Brexit because they felt unwelcome. British-trained doctors are leaving the UK in numbers for where the grass is greener. The huge disruption of Covid. Around 50,000 clinical vacancies nationwide. Nowhere near enough doctors and nurses in training. The NHS is a political football at the mercy of posturing politicians. Just a few reasons for the massive mess.

Nomoneyinthebank

I had breast cancer resulting in a double mastectomy in 2008 and then again in 2017 when a new cancer developed from the tissue of my skin used in the reconstruction 8 years later. I had an ultrasound exam for five years after that. Then nothing.

After querying this with The Royal Marsden, they refused to do further annual check-ups because I was told the NHS “guidelines” state that check-ups are only required for five years after a double mastectomy. These are guidelines, not rules, which my body clearly does not adhere to, given the eight-year gap between my cancers.

I have twin daughters – one in Canada, the other in Australia. The guidelines for these countries mean they both receive an annual MRI scan from the age of 30, because of my history. Yet the NHS refuses to check me. Rigid, lacking in common sense, false economy.

Aryhian1

Not enough beds or staff to match the workload. I have recently gone private to have an operation (the NHS waiting list is nearly 12 months) to relieve extreme pain when walking or standing. Ironically, I could only afford to do this because of my NHS pension (which I paid into for 47 years).

AndyB

I was diagnosed with stage four cancer four years ago. I had an operation five weeks later and, I’ve been on chemotherapy more or less continuously ever since. Currently, I attend the hospital every two weeks for chemo, as well as a mix of face-to-face and phone consultations. I have nothing but praise for the treatment I’ve received, and I am very grateful to the NHS and all the staff who’ve treated me.

Boz

I’m not sure what my surgery does anymore. It used to be full of people waiting to see the doctor. I got called for a check-up by the nurse. I sat in an empty waiting room, saw one person come in, and no one came out of the rooms. I was called 20 minutes later than my appointment time, which I would have considered acceptable in the past, but now I wondered what the nurse sitting in the room was doing during her time on her own.

Morgan

I can only speak as I find, and that is that I have received excellent treatment from the NHS over many years, notwithstanding errors of communication that occasionally happen in any organisation. Family connections have told me of computer system incompatibilities, which must be annoying, but not my experience of course. Covid messed things up a fair amount, as did progressive attempts by some politicians to go the American way and push insurance medicine.

DaveN12

The data communication between hospital and GP is seemingly incompatible, which causes problems, and there are numerous systemic shortfalls which are too numerous to mention.

If you are seriously ill, however, the quality and provision of treatment services are still excellent and should be applauded rather than continually criticised.

My husband was diagnosed with a very serious and life-threatening condition in November 2022. His treatment started in December 2022 and has continued to date.

All of the staff, ranging from consultants, surgeons, and nurses to all ancillary staff, have shown nothing but care and kindness in a very skilled and professional manner throughout. This has been a very difficult time for us, but we have nothing but praise for the skills, hard work, and dedication provided.

newmarket

First example: The NHS in our area (Bucks) is as close to a total joke as one can find! I’ve been waiting more than 14 months for a GP-assessed “urgent” dermatology appointment for a burn that won’t heal, and the county dermatology group downgraded it to “routine” WITHOUT ever even seeing me! I have just this week been back to our GP who has again raised an “urgent” referral, which I strongly believe will lead to nowt.

Second example: I was in hospital (Berks.) in Dec 2019 for a severe bout of pneumonia. I had Bupa at the time and then saw a Bupa specialist (a Bucks NHS doctor!) who confirmed some additional lung investigation and a procedure likely would be needed. When I lost my job, after waiting 18 months to get back to that NHS doctor, she discounted everything she said needed to be/would be done.

Third example: After I was discharged from the hospital for that 2019 stay, I was given 17 pages of printouts. I asked what to do with them and why they weren’t being sent electronically. I was told the NHS trusts don’t share electronically between (at least) Berks and Bucks. Great stuff, as we are now reverting back to the 1970s!

Farce. Waste of time. Waste of money.

SpendThrifty

Both my husband and I are ex-NHS workers – now retired. Our son is also an NHS frontline worker and, like many, suffered a great deal during the pandemic. I don’t now recognise the institution I trained and worked in, where the emphasis was on ever-improving patient care.

I do remember the Blair years when the NHS flourished with proper funding, waiting lists were shorter, staffing levels and morale were high, and the delivery of care was motivated by patient needs.

For nearly 15 years I have lived with a post-surgical complication which has had a huge impact on my life. Instead of care, I have been gaslighted, intermittently offered help, then left waiting years for nothing, several times ‘lost in the system’ and frequently being passed from one department to another. I know I am not alone.

I really want to see care for the NHS restored by proper funding, and management allowed to do the time-consuming background work that is needed to keep it on its feet, instead of being vilified. Clinical staff should be free to deliver patient care; they can only do this with adequate funding and managed support. I would like to see a return to smaller regions and more equity nationally. As pensioners, neither myself nor my husband have confidence that we will receive the care we might need in our older age.

Worrying times, in more ways than one.

Claraknell

Some of the comments have been edited for this article for brevity and clarity. You can read the full discussion in the comments section of the original article here.

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Source: UK Politics - www.independent.co.uk