Total waste of time (NHS Direct)

Member Name: worst_trip

Product:	NHS Direct
Date:	07/06/09 (28 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: None

Disadvantages: Operators have no useful information to give; this 'service' is a waste of time

As a site warden at the halls of residence at an out of town College, I often had cause to ring NHS direct on behalf of the students living on site. As I was only ever on wardening duty in the evening I only ever called NHS direct out of hours, but irrespective of the query (and admittedly, most - thoug not all - of the problems I dealt with involved students who had been drinking too much) their response was always exactly the same: take the affected person immediately to the local Accident and Emergency ward in your nearest town.

After a while I cut out the middle man of NHS Direct, so to speak, and just took to taking the students straight to A&E.

I can accpet that NHS Direct had to err on the side of caution, most of my previous queries being young students / drink-related. I did however have cause to ring the service last month to ask for some background information on medical testing services in the NHS, which the so-called NHS 'health professional' I had been dealing with in person proved completely clueless. I had had an NHS blood test for toxoplasmosis, a disease dangerous to preganant women, but after three weeks wait (initially I was told the result would be available in a week) had still had not been given the test result. I wanted to know if a delay of this type was 'standard' or not.

I had to give all my personal details to the NHS helpline operator before they would even consider taking my call. This was time consuming, and incuded my giving the name and address of my doctor; they also logged my call as an official query. When it came to me asking them for informaiton they were no help whatsoever and said they couldn't give advice on such topics.

I object to having had to reveal personal details and to having had an 'official' query logged on my behalf, when in fact NHS Direct were able to do nothing to help me. I have rung the service dozens of times, mostly on behalf of others, but never once have been given any useful advice from the service. I find that it is, frankly, rubbish.

Summary: Total waste of time