A Rant, by Elizabeth Kay

Communication systems are now being organised, in the main, by people under fifty with no disabilities and a reasonable income.

As readers and writers, we should be concerned not only about the language in which we communicate, but also the means of communication which have already excluded some sections of society. And when this comes to medical matters, the effects can be fatal.      

Yes, I did do A/L zoology

We thought the internet was a wonderful thing, for disseminating knowledge and getting in touch with people on the other side of the world. We would learn so much. And so we have – we can look up any number of symptoms and decide what is wrong with us. I have always had a reasonable knowledge of medicine, starting with A/L zoology which gave me a good idea of how a mammalian body works. I used to be asked if I had a medical background, and would reply with a smile that I was an enthusiastic amateur. That’s not funny any more. Doctors these days assume that you have looked up everything on the internet, both the good and bad, and may be paying attention to the most ludicrous diagnoses and subsequent advice. Therefore, they don’t listen any more when you say what’s wrong with you, even though you know you’re right from decades of experience managing the same condition.

            Getting an appointment has become an obstacle course for some, more like snakes and ladders than anything else. An appointment comes by letter, if you’re lucky, so up the ladder you go. A couple of weeks later it’s cancelled, and re-booked for three months later. Down the snake. Your symptoms are getting worse, so you ring up and make a fuss. You’re given a website to use. Up the ladder. Only, there are no empty slots and you’re asked to try again later. Down the snake, and so on and so on until you get motion sickness on top of everything else. And for those who rely on the postal service, things are even worse. A few months ago I had an ridiculously high FIT score, as a result of an abdominal infection in Madagascar. I was fast-tracked onto the cancer pathway, and allocated a colonoscopy the following week. I was told I needed to prepare for this with a diet plan several days in advance, and that I would receive all the information as well as two doses of a very powerful laxative by first class post. The letter didn’t arrive. I didn’t panic, and waited right up until the last minute before ringing the hospital. They told me to go straight in, and they’d prepare another package for me to take home. I picked it up as told, and all went well. I didn’t have cancer, and the FIT score went back to normal. The original package arrived ten days after it was posted by the hospital – first class, as promised. On the day of the procedure I was asked if I wanted an earlier space, as the person before me had cancelled. You guessed it – she hadn’t received the package either.

            Communication is supposedly better since computers have taken charge. So what happened when my dentist referred me to the maxillo-facial department and I heard nothing? One phone call simply informed me that the waiting list was very long, but after a year had gone by I rang again. The consultant to whom I had been referred had retired, but no one had told my dentist. I was told I would have to get my dentist to refer me all over again. Needless to say, I went spare and they eventually found me an appointment two weeks later with someone else. After a trip to A&E by ambulance on 14^th October 2023 (and the paramedics were absolutely wonderful) I was discharged and told I would get a quick follow-up appointment. It eventually came – for the 21st March 2024. This was then bumped to the 27^th June, and then to the 19^th September and finally to the 3^rd October. Appointments were no help, and they were very sorry. I emailed the Patient Advice and Liaison Service, with all the relevant information, and was allocated a new appointment on 26^th June. I hate complaining, as I know the NHS is overworked and underpaid. But these three instances were all possible because A) I could get my husband to drive me to the hospital to pick up the replacement package B) I could use the internet C) I wasn’t deaf and could use the phone.

            Landlines will soon be going digital, so you will need a router to use them. It’s expected that everyone will have a mobile phone, and a contract to use it. Mobile phones are very difficult for the elderly, whose sight is not what it once was. Nor is their hearing or their fingers, as arthritis kicks in. This is not the same thing as being stupid.

And then there’s parking. More and more car parks are dispensing with coins and notes altogether, and relying on parking apps. However, the powers that be seem to delight and placing them where the phone signal is weak or non-existent, probably in the hope that you won’t have time to get a parking ticket to display on your windscreen, and they can give you a different sort of ticket altogether. Mole Valley decided to install parking charges at various beauty spots which were starting points for walks. For this wonderful new parking system (the same company that hit the news for charging houseboats to moor at exorbitant prices) you had to estimate within half an hour how long your walk was going to  be, and pay the appropriate fee in advance. The fines for not doing so were draconian, and heaven help you if you had to take a detour during your walk (fallen trees, floods) and were late back. I went to a council meeting that explained how much money they were going to make from this scheme, which would pay for the cost of setting up the system many times over. But for once, I saw people power in action. We all boycotted the car parks, and no one used them. 9 months later the whole set-up was taken down, and once more we can go for walks without worrying about the time. How I laughed. But well done anyone in Mole Valley who is reading this, although we’re not going to be Mole Valley for much longer. Maybe we’re a troublesome borough, because we’ve now been merged with Epsom and Ewell.

And another thing. Virtual keyboards. I have just deleted a week’s worth of emails from my tablet. Without realising (sitting on the sofa with it on my lap), I had touched select all and then delete. Fortunately, there was a way of recovering them – go to deletions, select everything up to what had become the first date on the emails left in the in-box, then go to restore on the menu and back they came. I’d never made that mistake before, but it’s like they say about homelessness – make two bad decisions, and you could be on the street too. It seems to be one of those unwritten rules of life – you can get away with one mistake, but make another before you’ve corrected the first and you’re in big trouble. Alan Bates (the Post Office Scandal whistle-blower) refused to sign off the contents of a spreadsheet he knew he hadn’t written. Other postmasters did, assuming they must have been the ones who had made a mistake. Later on, they had to admit to false accounting and some of them went to prison as well as losing their homes, their livelihoods and their health.

If we don’t rant we are sitting ducks for the next scam – and these days the scams may come from a source we always considered to be above reproach.

Rant about it! Words still have power!