"Sick child who was left to wait in ED waiting room for 6 hours"

I attended Peel Health Campus after my child had been having ongoing high grade fevers for over 48 hours that were not coming down with paracetamol. Additionally, they had not been eating or drinking since becoming unwell. Specifically, on this night, I had given my child Panadol, and then 2/2.5 hours later, their temperature was back up in the 39’s. I then gave them Nurofen which they immediately spewed up. I then thought it was reasonable to bring them to ED as I was concerned about them potentially having febrile convulsions.

I presented at the ED and was triaged. We waited in the ED waiting room for 6 hours at which point we still had not been admitted, the nurse had waited until they could give more Panadol and they also conducted a PCR test to confirm if my child had flu, RSV, covid or viruses (this came back negative for everything).

After 6 hours of waiting, myself and my child were both exhausted and I have another child at home who I needed to care for. It was clear my child was not a priority on the triage list as there were several people who came at the same time or after us that went in before they did.

There was also another patient who was complaining of severe abdominal pain, yet had used Uber Eats to get dominos delivered to the ED and even they were seen before us (try make sense of that one). After our failed attempt at Peel, I ended up taking my child to a different hospital 2 days later where it was discovered they had a UTI and kidney infection, their CRP markers in their blood were at 150 (supposed to be between 0 - 50) and because their lymph nodes in their tummy were so swollen my child had intussusception in their intestines. They spent until that 4 days in hospital on IV antibiotics.

I feel like there was no real concern for my child at Peel, they were definitely not a priority in the triage. Yet they were a very sick little child. How hard would it have been to ask me to try get a urine sample where it would have been immediately evident what was wrong.

If my child had received care when we first attended Peel, perhaps they wouldn’t have required the strong interventions that they did require. 

I knew in my gut that something was not right with my child and I hope this serves as a reminder to all families of young children to advocate for your child.