Tell them that you are a driver.

Posted , 4 users are following.

An optician referred my wife to the eye hospital as she is developing cataracts. After her eye check the doctor asked her if she drives. When my wife said that she doesn't drive she was told that her cataracts can wait a bit but if she was a driver she should have done them now. 

A new form of NHS discrimination ? So even if you do not drive tell them that you do for faster treatment.

1 like, 14 replies

14 Replies

  • Posted

    Wow, what a thing to happen. I have often wondered what line of the eye test, would be required to still allow one to drive. But this is a different thing. Does anyone know the requirement on the eye test, before they say you cannont drive!!!!
  • Posted

    Yes, I wonder that too - I suspect there might be a way to Google the answer to what is required on driving tests - would probably be different for each state, country, etc.  I worry about telling the insurance folks anything in case they cut the car insurance!
  • Posted

    I don't see how that's discriminatory:  surely it's a matter of safety on the roads?  I was bumped up the list here in Australia because I live alone in a rural area where I need to drive and may have to evacuate myself by car if a bushfire approaches.  Others who don't drive or don't need to or have a driver in their household may see that as discriminatory, but I don't.

    Surely the sort of lie you're suggesting would, if successful, mean that someone else who does need to drive would have to wait longer?

    • Posted

      Hardly a lie but evidently a way for the NHS to cut waiting lists.

      Two years ago I was not asked if I was a driver, I'm not and had my procedure about six weeks after my appointment. In fact then I was told that my cataracts were not too bad and asked if I wanted them done now or to wait. Having been short sighted since a child I jumped at the now option. 

    • Posted

      The heading to the post reads "Tell them you're a driver" ... when you're not .. how is that not a lie?

      You may be right about cutting waiting lists, but it may also be a way of priotising whose need is more urgent, as was the case for me under the Australian public health system.   There's also the issue of road safety:  most of us with cataracts may theoretically have good enough eyesight to still be driving, but it's certainly not safe to drive at night with cataracts and I've found my distance estimation enormously improved after surgery on the worst eye.

      I do know that there's a lot of variation under public health system here:  Melbourne's Eye & Ear Hospital were taking weeks to even get me on to the waiting list, with repeated reqeusts for more referrals, and it would then have taken up to 18 months for the worst eye to be done.  I discovered by chance that other public hospitals here also do cataract surgery and got an appointment within a fortnight and surgery about 5 weeks later.  The other eye will be done towards the end of January.  If I'd waited for the Eye & Ear Hospital I would've been totally blind befoe I got any surgery at all.

      The public health system here would certainly make you wait if your cataracts were "not too bad" so it sounds as if you were lucky to have yours sorted so quickly.

    • Posted

      You seem to be rather obtuse or is Aussie understanding of how we Brits speak confusing to you?

      " The heading to the post reads "Tell them you're a driver" ... when you're not .. how is that not a lie?"

      The tell them is obviously not me but others here in the U.K. as my procedures have already been done.

      "The public health system here would certainly make you wait if your cataracts were "not too bad" so it sounds as if you were lucky to have yours sorted so quickly"

      No, that's the way it was at that time as people in England and Scotland were being done quickly. That evidently from other posters did not apply to Wales and Northern Ireland.

      I'm in S.E. England where the three failing Health Authorities are now under 'Special Measures' Perhaps they are now trying to look better by selective pruning of the waiting lists as has happened in the past. Patients are supposed to be seen and treated within eighteen weeks. I was not so fortunate when waiting for heart valve surgery as it was 54 weeks from my first appointment to having surgery. 

    • Posted

      Your first sentence is inappropriate for this forum:  disagree with me by all means, as I do with you, but  there's no need for sniping remarks about Australians and our alleged "obtuseness."    

      I won't be surprised if the moderators take your post down for those very reasons but I'm not into reporting peope so let's see what happens.

      Have a good xmas and new year ......

      I concede you were advising others to tell a lie rather than teling one yourself but that doesn't change the tenor of my response

    • Posted

      Well you were calling me a liar and obviously not realising that my heading and my reply contained typical British ironic humour.

      Are you enjoying the present heatwave down there? I see that horse racing was cancelled in Melbourne yesterday for the sake of horses and humans.

      G'night.

      “possibly a word that originally rooted from the phrase "good night" in australlia. Im going to bed, g'night.

    • Posted

      I'm not enjoying the heatwave at all, as I live in a high bushfire area:  awaiting cool change in the next few hours and a couple of cool days in the low 20's (Australian irony regarding your summers, just in case you're as obtuse as you accuse me of being!).

      Sleep well .......

    • Posted

      We were in Adelaide in 2007 when it was very hot and saw the evidence of the previous years bush fires in the area.
  • Posted

    Was this for this new treatment IOL  I have just heard about as I can't have laser due to long  & short sight & astigmatism as well as cateracts  diagnosed 2 yrs ago.I also am extremely squeamish with astrong blink reflex .Are you or can you be sedated ?
    • Posted

      It would be for IOL. I guess that you can be sedated, they use a clamp like thing to keep your eye open and the drops in your eye or injection make it totally painless. Its all over in less than fifteen minutes. Really easy procedure.

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