I was sweating, in pain, had a fever and was passing in and out of consiousness. My parents sat up all night with me and they were certainly very worried.

The discussed whether they should call the doctor. I thoght they should, but they did not do so. I do not know why.

To-day anyone would say that you were a bad parent if you did not call for help for a child in these circumstances.

There are many reasons why they may not have wished to call the doctor at night.

Had they paid the last bill?
Could they not afford to pay the next bill?
Had the doctor not rendered a bill for the last treatment because he thought my parents could not afford to pay it?
Was the doctor single handed?
Was he himself ill, or very old?
Couldn’t they be bothered going out to the public telephone?

I have seen good hospitals and bad ones, in the UK and other countries. I have been part of the management team that in 1974 was responsible for what was then officially recognised as the worst hospital in Scotland.

Last month my wife was taken in as an emergency in the middle of the night to the hospital staffed by the successors in the same GP practice that was not called to see me when I was a child.

I tried to think of any aspect of her treatment or the service provided by ambulance or hospital that was less than perfect and capable of being improved.

There was only one. The wooden front door of the hospital has seen some service. Often not fully opened because of the wind, it has been knocked about possibly for as much as a century by people passing through with walking aids, wheelchairs and stretchers. It could be replaced by one designed for a higher performance level.

Should I complain to my MSP? The last time I emailed him with a comment about the NHS he FWD’d it to the minister and other colleagues.

@NeilA – I guess your experience if the NHS must be limited. The issue at hand is that many managers are termed as such yet hold a clinical responsibility and are accountable for the effective dleivery of care. Thus its not a reasonable assumption that all managers have no patient impact as appears to be your assertion.

Lets be honest here, no private sector solution is suitable for the NHS, good bargaining power and efficient use of resources are what we must achieve. However RBS and Lloyds TSB are private and see what they’ve done for us. Thus capitalists keep out of the NHS as you will rue the day you let your chummies interfere and all you will be left with is a system for those who can pay – and lets be honest very few of us (you) would agree to paying for your mothers ten week hospital stay after a stoke…..

Pete B says that GPs, as small businessmen, are predominately sympathetic to the Conservatives. I do not doubt it, though I have met many exceptions.

Superficially, one of these observations must be inconsistent with an observed fact.

The last (UK) BMA conference was in Edinburgh and addressed by Nicola Sturgeon, the SNP’s Health Secretary and Deputy Leader. She got several standing ovations (four I think).

Now there were probably more than usual proportion of Scottish members present, and the BMA is much more than GP’s, but I think that this shows that it is unhelpul to assume that any political credo is driving these common sense changes.

Rather it demonstrates that you can get to be Scottish Politcian of the Year, and hugely popular, just by undoing impractical daft ideas which have originated in political philosophies in ignorance of practical issues in the real world.

You don’t need to do anything clever, such is the competition.

This might seem a pedantic point, but it does mean that is almost certainly false to say, for example, that Pulse surveyed 326 GPs on their voting intentions.