Adrian Chiles’s experience (What I learned from a freezing night in A&E with my dad, 31 January) is sadly the norm. Working as a pharmacist in a GP surgery, and also having had a close family member suffer a stroke last year, I see this from both sides and completely agree with him that the problems start following discharge.
Despite all the chaos that ensues during an emergency visit to hospital, the system does work and patients do get sorted, albeit slowly. The problem lies with the disconnected IT systems between the hospital and GP, or even between different hospitals, and the lack of patients’ understanding of this. It’s not unreasonable to assume that all your relevant information has landed neatly into your doctor’s inbox, and that someone will call or visit. Sadly, this is often not the case – discharge summaries from hospital can be late or incomplete, and sometimes don’t turn up at all. Some are still handwritten.
