Residents who have benefited the most from the Whittington Hospital’s threatened Accident & Emergency department speak out. Is it a facility too vital to lose?
“My baby might not have lived”
Unaware her baby, Holly, had a life-threatening virus, Maeve Haran took her to the nearby A&E. The proximity of the Whittington to her home saved Holly’s life
Living near a hospital is very reassuring. You trust it. When my daughter was extremely ill as a baby, if we didn’t live near the Whittington, I would have said, “It’s half an hour away. We’ll wait until the morning.” But thankfully the Whittington was just around the corner – and it saved her life.
Holly was a month old when she started wheezing. Over the course of a week, I took her to the doctor’s three times, but they assured me she was fine.
One evening my husband and I went out and left Holly with my mother-in-law. When we came home at 11.30, she was weak and floppy. My husband and his mother said she needed to go to hospital, but I was cross because I had already taken her to the doctor. My husband said that the Whittington was just around the corner so, even though it was late, I agreed.
As soon as we got there, alarm bells started ringing. The staff immediately took off her clothes and put her in a box of steam. It was heartbreaking seeing this tiny body with small tubes coming out of her nose. They said she had bronchiolitis, which is an inflammation of air passages to the lungs caused by a virus. The doctors said she might not have made it through the night if we hadn’t brought her in.
I was so worried I didn’t leave her for a week. I slept on the floor every night, checking on her every hour until she recovered eight days later. The frightening thing is that we wouldn’t have taken her to the hospital if we hadn’t been so close. The next nearest hospital is the Royal Free in Hampstead, which would have taken at least half an hour to reach. If we had waited until morning our baby might not have survived.
Now I’m backing the campaign to keep the A&E open. Life throws us these emergencies and we need to be prepared. The Whittington saved my daughter’s life. Now it’s my turn to come to the rescue.
“They nursed him back to health”
Judy Bentinck thought her son had flu, until he rushed into her bedroom clutching his chest. She drove him to the Whittington because paramedics told her it would take too long for an amulance to arrive.
When your 18-year-old son bursts into your bedroom at 2am clutching his chest and shouting about horrible pains in his left arm, you just don’t think it’s possible that he’s having a heart attack. He’d had flu for the past few days, but nothing as bad as this.
I rang NHS Direct and told them what was happening, but they said I’d have to wait while they tried to contact a doctor. After what felt like forever, someone called me and told me they were sending a paramedic.
The paramedic arrived, and said we had to get Will to the hospital immediately. I started to call an ambulance, but he said that even the few minutes it would take to get to us would be too long – we had to get him there ourselves.
Paramedics aren’t allowed to take passengers, so I had to drive him. It was my worst nightmare, rushing down the streets to the Whittington. We live in Holloway, so it wasn’t very far, but it felt like it took a really long time.
When we got there, I drove straight into the ambulance bay. They got him in a wheelchair and took him in. By this time, it was 3am.
They stabalised him, and started running tests. By 6.30am, they confirmed that he had suffered a heart attack. Later that day, they discovered it had been caused by his flu. Apparently, the virus had damaged Will’s heart. He’d had some leg pains the day before, but we didn’t associate them with flu at all.
He was transferred to a specialist heart hospital two days later, and had to be really careful not to raise his heart rate for next six months while his heart healed, and everything is fine now.
I can’t help thinking that if it had been any further to the hospital, he could have had another heart attack. It could have been fatal, and for that reason, I thank the Whittington for saving his life.
“The ambulance crew were amazing”
Gill Phillips resuscitated her daughter Mary after the five-week-old stopped breathing in her sleep. She then spent 11 days in the Whittington
I gave my daughter the kiss of life when she stopped breathing in her sleep. Back when Mary was little, you were told to have babies sleep on their tummies. Since the cot death controversy, the advice has changed to have them sleep on their side or back. Mary only had a snuffle, and I didn’t think much of it, but one evening when she was five weeks old, she stopped breathing.
I called an ambulance, and they were absolutely amazing, they were here so quickly. In the meantime, I got her breathing again, but she was extremely cold and limp.
The ambulance rushed her to the Whittington, and they started running tests. Eventually, they concluded that it was the combination of her slight cold and her sleeping on her front.
They kept her in the hospital for the next 11 days, doing tests. They never really told me what they were looking for, but I guessed because she hadn’t had oxygen for a while they were checking if she had brain damage.
If anything had gone wrong, she must have been going to be incredibly brainy, because she’s now a very clever girl in spite of what she went through. She’s now at university, and is making her own way as a young entrepreneur.
The proximity of the hospital was obviously a good thing, and this incident really shows how important it is for all aspects of the system to be tightly controlled and working together.
The ambulance came so quickly and the staff were so wonderful, I have to give credit where it’s due.
