Doctors refused to help my son (From Darlington and Stockton Times)

Doctors refused to help my son

8:00am Monday 14th May 2012 in News By Vicki Henderson, Darlington reporter

A YOUNG mother has hit out at the doctors and nurses in an NHS walk-in centre for refusing to help after her two-year-old son fell and suffered a serious injury in the waiting room.

Linzi Bakan, 26, said she was horrified by the lack of compassion shown by staff at the Doctor Piper House Urgent Care Centre, in Darlington, who repeatedly told her to take her son, Apo, to accident and emergency, even though he was bleeding heavily.

Mrs Bakan, of Whitwell Road, in Darlington, took Apo to the centre with her husband, also called Apo, for a routine appointment last week.

The family were walking towards the waiting area when the toddler tripped over his feet and banged his head on a chair, causing a cut that went down to his skull.

Despite Mrs Bakan’s cries for help, staff refused to help on the grounds that they did not have the facilities to treat the wound.

Mrs Bakan, who is five months pregnant with her second child, said: “There was blood pouring out of Apo’s head. I could see his skull.

“A doctor walked in from outside and said we would have to go to A&E because they didn’t deal with things like that.

“No one behind reception even got up to offer help.

“I was hysterical because I could see his skull and there was so much blood, and eventually a nurse took us into a room to try and calm me down, but she still said we would have to go to A&E.

“They just didn’t want to know, there was no compassion.

“We were in a place full of doctors and nurses – it should have been the best place for something like that to happen, but it just felt like they wanted us out.”

Apo was taken to Darlington Memorial Hospital for emergency treatment, and was later transferred to The University Hospital of North Durham, in Durham City, where his wound was stitched by a plastic surgeon under general anaesthetic.

Mrs Bakan has written a letter of complaint about the lack of care shown to her son to NHS County Durham and Darlington Primary Care Trust (PCT).

A spokeswoman for the PCT said she could not comment on individual cases due to patient confidentiality.