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The Medical debacle

I know there are many people out there who think of we old and infirm as being a waste of space, but we don't deserve to be seen purely as guinea pigs.

What is the frail one burbling about, you ask?

Well, it's a recent study that has me worried, one that shows that one in five fellow fogies suffer major cock-ups during surgery or in post-op care, and 14% of us suck the big one because of a mistake.

Now this is worrying, especially as I'm facing a big operation next week, and seems to stem from the fact that we oldies get to visit hospitals more regularly than other folks and the fact that the hospitals are teaching people the business of medicine.

Fair enough that staff need to learn things, but do they have to be trained on those of us who are already at death's door and can't afford private health cover?

I don't know what an acceptable quality ratio is in manufacturing, but if a company was found to be stuffing up more than five per cent of its goods or services then you'd think it would be out of business fairly quickly.

So how come the heart surgery in our hospitals has a cock-up rate of 20%? After all, heart surgery is no minor matter and before going under the knife you'd like to think you had a better survival chance than that.

Anyway, it doesn't help the pre-op nerves and I have to say the bottle of medicinal whisky has been getting a fair old nudge since I heard those figures.

If you're interested, I'm in for a hip replacement. It's not due to a fall, but rather an over-enthusiastic matron.

So let's just look at the success rate of hip replacements on those over 92. Oh good, six out of nine die. That makes my day.

If there is something that has really got up your nose, let Grumpy Old Coot know at grumpy@webwombat.com