"So very slow. Though an urgent referral meant..."

I am writing this on behalf of my husband, the patient, as he is busy making phone calls to yourselves that he should not have to be making. After having an ongoing problem for three months my husband was finally referred to the respitory department. As his problem was by then deemed urgent he was sent to DCH rather than our preferred and more convenient hospital at Poole. His initial appointment was a couple of weeks later on 12th April. He was told that he would need further tests and a CT scan andwhen asked when these would likely to be he was told in the next two weeks. The lung function tests took place exactly four weeks afterwards on 10th May and the scan some ten days after that on 20th May On completion of the scan he asked how long the results would take (by this time we were both somewhat stressed over his health and the waiting that had taken place) and was told it should be two weeks but that if he had not heard in three to ring us as "we may have forgotten you". Today, three days short of that three weeks and fed up with our life being on hold whist waiting for an appointment, he has rung the respitory clinic to be told that they do not,as yet, have his scan results.In a further phone call to the CT department he has been that he should never have been advised that the wait would only be two weeks. However it would appear that his scan has now finally been allocated for review and should be complete in two to three days and sent to the consultant. Has this anything to do with today's phone calls?

At no point has anyone suggested that his problem is any less urgent now than it was when he was referred. So why is everything taking so long? I am told by friends that this is how the NHS is now. It would have been preferable to us for that initial appointment to have broken the so called deadline and to have waited longer for Poole. That alone would have saved us the drive to Dorchester and iniquitous hospital parking charges. (we have bus passes perfectly usable for Poole. There is no direct bus to Dorchester for us!) . The whole experience of DCH thus far has been abysmal, mostly due to lack of communication between departments and the patient. Would never recommend on current experience.