Letter: Listless maladies

However, I cannot believe that it is only younger patients who are affected, or only those in Scotland.

In the case of a close friend with late diagnosed, advanced ovarian cancer a major London teaching hospital could not also cope with her congenital heart condition.

My husband, who had bowel cancer, also needed attention from urology but found the information given varied greatly.

Because his admission to hospital had been rather rushed, he had a outstanding dental problem, which no-one in the colorectal department thought had anything to do with them.

We are not inarticulate and solved the problem ourselves but the wards were full of older patients with no-one to fight their corner.

There was no system of complaint, because one didn’t want to become “that dreadful thing, an awkward patient”, in the words of another sufferer.

I also wonder how the newly revealed misuse of the waiting lists impacts on the treatment of patients as “whole people”.

Someone suffering serious symptoms cleared by speciality A is presumably then sent to the bottom of the waiting list in speciality B with no improvement in their morale.

Marina Donald

Tantallon Place

Edinburgh