Defence Medical Services

[higthepig]

I have just been medically downgraded due to a bad hip. Besides not being able to do my annual beep test (wow), I have also been told that I am not liable to go out of area until it is sorted. I now find myself at the mercy of a NHS specialist who has a 8-9 month waiting list for a consultation before anything is done about the problem. Do we have any specialists left? It now means that someone else has to go away in my place therefore meaning that detachments come around more often for those who are unfortunatley well. Is this another form of over-stretch? In my squadron of about 30 there are 2 others who are also downgraded. I know it is not much of a sample but it is 10% who are stuck here, if that is Air Force wide it represents a large number. What happend to our hospitals and priority treatment? Am I just moaning or is this another thing that is gradually being eroded from the service that I joined. I must add that I am not aircrew, I wonder if you get treated any quicker? <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

[6nandneutral]

At least you won't have to worry about losing your flying pay if you are downgraded for more than 12 months. Seriously though you may be able to get the RAF to pay for you to go private, it might actually save them money on the long run. You've nothing to lose by asking. Give it a try, good luck, and let us know if you are successful or not.

[higthepig]

Thanks for the reply, but I feel going private is not the answer as we are limited with budgets etc (like all other stations) also when I joined I was told all our medical needs would be looked after. Times have changed and quality of life things like this are slowly being eroded. It is what makes the service less fun and more hassle than it used to be. I realise that some things have to change but the whole idea of an armed force is one that is capable of projecting power and not staying at home with an excused boot chit! <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

[higthepig]

Thanks for the reply, but I feel going private is not the answer as we are limited with budgets etc (like all other stations) also when I joined I was told all our medical needs would be looked after. Times have changed and quality of life things like this are slowly being eroded. It is what makes the service less fun and more hassle than it used to be. I realise that some things have to change but the whole idea of an armed force is one that is capable of projecting power and not staying at home with an excused boot chit! <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

[Sven Sixtoo]

HTP

Stuck Transmit - check switch <img src="smile.gif" border="0">

Sven

[Up Very Gently]

Hey Hig, you ain't alone me old. I've just had an Operation, 7 years after the problem first arose. And in those 7 years I've been treated for Gout, Arthritis and Rheumatism before being told I was imagining it. Finally a Doc realised something was wrong, and 2 years after that, it's been operated on, badly.

Do we really have a Defence Medical Service? Judging from half the senile old duffers who seem to serve as locums in my SMC, it's more like a home for the Aged. And having seen some right ones go through SERE these days, I suspect it won't get much better. BUPA has got to be the better option.

Perhaps this will be addressed as part of the non-remuneration package, although I doubt it.

Gabe <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

[eviltwin]

The decline in the Defence Medical Services is a direct result of the atrocious management over the years. The hierarchy make decisions, move on then are completely unaccountable. There are some brilliant doctors still in the service that try their hardest and try novel ways to solve this perpetuating situation. There are also more brilliant ones leaving in droves.. .Here's the rub, a GP can earn typically £80k a year full time as a partner. There are lots of overheads and lots of committment (like a second morgage) but there is a certain amount of stability (if only the government would stop fiddling with the system) and control over your life. An RAF Sqn Ldr doc earns about £50k, ok no overheads but consider the extra hassle of all the NHS paperwork, plus 6000s, plus Health and Safety committees, etc. A 1 in 4 on call rotation as well as 1 in 4 weekends locked up on base, unless you live on the patch were you can stay at home, but then you're on 24/7 on call to all your surrounding neighbours. Then every few months the Queen sends you away to a complete ****hole, again and again and again.. .Now most docs can't be arsed with that. Some people love it, all that adventure great for them but eventually you get bored of it. Even most glass chewing FJ mates get bored of the constant upheavel when they actually mature past puberty and start getting serious with their girl of this week (sorry guys just making a point). Some even get married and have children inside their home base's FIR <img src="wink.gif" border="0"> . .Docs are generally more mature due to the length and nature of their training and it happens sooner for them.. .The fact that they are treated like **** by the Sqns is another thing altogether, which is a whole other subject.. .This is why the medical services are 50% undermanned putting more pressure on those still in and thus causing even more problems.. .In answer to your original question, yes there are some specialists left in the services, but not many. They are enjoying their leave mostly and taking advantage of the free sailing club just around the corner from where they work!. .Ask the question about the private operation? the cash doesn't come out of your units budget. Why have you got a problem asking to spend Queenies' money. Has she had a problem making you SDO straight after coming back from a det? Cancelling leave because some bloke flew an airliner into a building, or 2 factions fighting over a 'field of crows'. Of course not, but you did it.. .We don't whinge, because we are loyal. Its time for the Service to be loyal back to you. Get your quality of life back, stop the pain, get them to sort you out. You have to push the docs abit because they are so maxed out they have to deal with the serious cases first, make your case serious to them! All I ask is be polite and if it works a little 'thank you' goes along way.. .Good luck

[ 07 February 2002: Message edited by: eviltwin ]</p>

[Doctor Cruces]

The nail in the coffin of Mil Medical Services was when the previous government started closing down military hospitals and re distributing our specialists into NHS hospitals to help treat NHS patients when they had the time. What in fact this really meant was that they would be chucked in with all the other hospital doctors to treat whoever came their way, NHS, service or what.

I also had a similar experience to the original poster, although I suspect that my case was incompetence more than everything else. I kept going to the Doc's complaining of painful joints and stiffness and was prescribed about a hundredweight of Bruffen and told to come back if it didn't clear up. On explaining my fears to one lady Flt Lt doc and explaining that my mother had suffered from Rheumatoid Arthritis I was told categorically that it was not hereditary (NOT what I had read as there had been shown to be a connection) and I definately DID NOT have RA. This went on from 1989 to 1993 when I finally got a doc with skill and competency who was absolutely livid that no-one had as yet had a blood test done on me. We did this there and then and when the results came back, guess what? Rheumatoid Arthritis. Immediate downgrading and at my medical board I was invited to leave the service or (generously) I could stay in and complete my remaining 10 months or so and thus receive my pension.

After that you can imagine I was fairly cynical about service doctors. I got excellent treatment from the specialists at Nocton before they closed it and moved everyone to Peterborough NHS hospital where my appointments became fewer, my time with the specialist shorter and my wait at the hospital longer as he dealt with NHS patients.

I was advised by someone to apply for a war pension on the grounds that as the RAF failed to diagnose my condition for several years, it was their fault that it had become so bad, given that I received no treatment specific to my complaint for such a long time. The War Pensions body upheld that view and awarded me a not insignificant, tax free pension for life and a reduced standard of occupation allowance which effectively doubles the pension.

The moral of the story is, DON'T be put of by docs that either can't be bothered or are plain not up to the task. I was and I am now disabled 40% according to the DSS.

I wish you luck in your quest for decent medical treatment, but don't expect it from the RAF. There are a lot of good ones but also a lot who couldn't make it in the real world. The good doc that had my bloods done left shortly after because of the declining standards of the military medical services.

Doc C.

[amyoungz]

An old story, but the old ones are the best...

I was on local leave some years back when I slipped on some muddy concrete and badly smashed up one knee. By the time I could get a lift to the SMC (an hour or so) the knee was well swollen, I was in agony and couldn't walk. The SMO accused me of MALINGERING (despite the fact that I was on leave, in civvies and covered in mud),told me that there was nothing wrong with me and to go away. Since going away was not really an option, I decided to make a fight of it.

Eventually the SMO relented and sent me to Wroughton for an x-ray. I arrived during the lunch break, but luckily I was examined quickly nonetheless. The doc who looked at the x-rays said it was bad practice to do so before examining the patient, but then pointed at my injured knee and continued "..but if I touch you there you're going to jump through the ceiling, aren't you?". He was right, and would probably have lost a hand if he'd tried it. Wise man.

The x-ray clearly showed several fragments of bone that had been chipped from the top of my shin-bone, just under the kneecap. These (sharp) fragments had lodged in the tendon, causing a haemorrhage and, consequently the pain and swelling.

The result? A week off flying after I finished my leave, with leg in splint from ankle to hip and some very powerful painkillers to enable me to sleep nights. I was subsequently offered surgery to remove the fragments, but it was held to be risky in terms of potential benefit and I declined it. Eventually the whole business healed up and now I only remember it when the weather changes and it twinges to remind me of the 'good old days'.

Since then, of course, their Airships have closed all the RAF Hospitals. I wonder how things would have been if Wroughton had not been there then? <img src="mad.gif" border="0"> <img src="mad.gif" border="0"> <img src="mad.gif" border="0">

[Ralf Wiggum]

The Airships were obviously aware that the Medical services needed reviewing, hence a large new Defence Medical Establishment that has been endorsed. This is to be run alongside some medical student fraternity. Hope they don't let the students practice on our fells. I believe it's already up and running too.

[Ali Barber]

My story:

I was diagnosed with a heart condition that would lose me my single seat pilot cat. the docs had missed it for almost 20 years of annual medicals and it was picked up by the computer that analysed the ECG at CME London. The docs then went "oh yeah" and "for you single-pilot is out". I got referred to a civvie hopital in Brompton who had one look through a key hole I never knew existed and, a weeks later, went back in through the same key hole and removed the offending part. One month later, all clear given by the civvie doc and no chance of it ever recurring. It took another year to persuade the RAF to convene a medical board and confirm my single-pilot status. In the meantime, I was posted to a ground tour anyway. The bottom line is they let me go Private and I never saw a bill, but it still took forever to get the medical branch to confirm my status once the treatment was over. I don't know what the answer to the big picture is, but my wife and kids are all covered by BUPA and I suspect I might join in as well.

[Flatus Veteranus]

HTP

Surely, under recent legislation, if the NHS cannot treat you in reasonable timescale (and for serving personnel that should mean "pronto")you should be treated elsewhere in the EU if you are willing. I should ask the Air Attaché in the city of your choice to get you some quotes.

[pconnor]

The unfortumate situations described above are not new - neither are they acceptable. They are however a symptom of the management of the DMS which for a number of years now has been totally ineffective in preventing the dismantling of the DMS 'Secondary Care service' (the services you get referred to once you've seen your GP). We are now integrated with the NHS, and as a previous post has noted, that means essentially that we work AS the NHS - with no priority to service patients at all. All secondary care is centrally controlled. Private care is certainly being used in the fields of orthopaedics (bones & joints) as well as some others. The service that military personnel get now is appalling and was predicted by almost all military doctors when the changes were happening. The problems of waiting times have been created by the management, who are now in the position of trying to solve it!. .The manning situation in the DMS is worse than you imagine. I can't go into details here, but you should know that things will only get worse.. .In peacetime, the history of the DMS is that it is scaled back. However, one might argue that we are not currently in peacetime, and that never before has the DMS been dismantled in the way it is now. Many in the DMS think that the percieved wisdom is that when needs dictate, the reserve forces will be called up 'enmasse' and will be an effective support force. This of course will happen just once - then the NHS trusts who employ these unfortunate souls will pull the plug - because the NHS will fall apart.. .Many military doctors are leaving now because there is no service life associated with the job (something many of us enjoyed), and despite what by any standards is excellent training, the jobs we end up mwith are often unfulfilling, and dominated in a way (i.e. NHS) we never imagined. When all of this is combined with the relatively poor pay of service doctors in comparison to NHS colleagues, the frequent deployments of essential branches (anaesthetists and surgeons), the good ones get out! All you guys get left with are those who are so committed that they end up getting bitter, or those who CAN'T get a job outside so have to stay in!. .The comment above relating to civilian doctors is I'm afraid, in my experience, warranted. The standard of civilian locum doctor in the DMS is not as high as it should be. Nor do I find them as committed to the principles of service medicine as those of us who joined with a sense of duty and loyalty.. .I hope this all makes sense, but in summary; . .1. You've got big problems. .2. It's going to get worse. .3. We told them - honest!. .4. Go private - the Mil will pay if you go through the correct channels and your unit back you. .5. Those of us left do care - but head and brickwalls come to mind!. .6. You guys are surely going through the same thing - but I see the military realise this (50,000 etc). .7. Shout - it might help our cause!

. . <img src="frown.gif" border="0"> <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

[Rats Naks]

Hig,

Before I begin my tale of woe, and hand you my advice, I owe many thanks to lots of Doctor's, nurse's etc following my mildly serious CAT 5 crash which left me as an "incomplete T12 paraplegic" as I believe it is known in the medical field.

As part of my long term rehab, I was sent to see a specialist near my base and thought nothing of the prompt appointment and plush waiting room. A month or so later, I was asked if I wanted to help pay for this "private" treatment? Because I was not with my parent unit, a bit of a "it's not coming from our budget" game began, needless to say I didn't foot the bill, so to speak, but if you do go for the private option, try to find out who will pay before you go?

I'm sure it was a one off - but no harm in asking? Once again many thanks to all our dedicated medical people who helped me - even if you are overstretched!!. . <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

[Big Green Arrow]

I benefitted greatly from living very clode to RAF Hospital Ely in my civvy years. I was always treated quickly and at that time the RAF boasted some excellent specialists. I also happened to live next door to a senior matron from the PMRAFNS, the late Sqn Ldr Carol Harrison, who extoled the benefits of the military system over the NHS. When I joined the RAF we still could boast some of the best services in Western Europe..and what now...poorly motivated, over-worked and under-valued doctors and nurses buoying up a system that needs in the region of £1bn+ spending on it to make it work like it should!

[higthepig]

Thanks for all the posts and it proves that I am not getting paranoid about it all. I thought I had a problem, not so, others are far worse off. Unfortunatly I very much doubt that the Shropshire airforce can afford private treatment, a few band-aids yes, expensise BMW driving golf course specialists no. I will try and when practice bleeding becomes an Olympic sport you will all be able to read about me on the back pages of RAF News. To all the service doctors out there, thank you very much but what is the attraction to service life, I admire your dedication but cannot understand your committment. I would have voted with my feet by now, having a marketable skill unlike Air Traffic Control, if only I could walk in a straight line. <img src="rolleyes.gif" border="0">