Robert Webb. Ian Rankin

Robert Webb

Dear NHS,

Let’s face it, most times we encounter the NHS we don’t tend to be in the sunniest of moods. It’s like a friend who reliably turns up on all of your shittest days. You feel like going, ‘Oh, YOU again! What is it with you? What is this weird interest you have with my health, you freakster?’ But then, very quickly, that tends to become, ‘Oh, I see. Yes, that does feel better. Will it …? Oh, so I should just …? OK, well thanks. That’s very nice of you. Thanks very much. And thanks for always being there.’

The NHS really is unique among public bodies. We don’t tend to feel the same level of affection for, say, the Citizen’s Advice Bureau or the Department for Work and Pensions. I think the difference is partly to do with the people. Don’t get me wrong – I’m sure both the CAB and the DWP are stuffed to the rafters with dedicated professionals who are all wonderful, as well as sexually attractive, human beings. But I imagine the work involved in those places and I (rather lazily, no doubt) think, ‘Yeah, I could probably do that.’

But then I imagine working in a hospital. And at that point I go a bit quiet. The work done on a daily basis by doctors, nurses and all the other frontline staff is quite beyond the likes of me. I like to think I’m not without compassion, but to dedicate your whole life to looking after people when they’re sick … that’s something else.

There are also the non-grumpy, non-miserable moments too. Thank you, NHS. Thank you for safely delivering our two daughters. Mainly, I thank their mother. But we had help.

Ian Rankin

I was a timid, risk-averse kid. Not sporty; pretty terrified of heights. Happier with my comics and music in my bedroom than on the sports field or a racing bike. So I never cut myself badly or suffered a concussion or broke any bones. I was also healthy (or do I mean lucky?) – no tonsils or appendix requiring removal – meaning I was no great burden to any NHS hospital. Mind you, I grew up in the halcyon days of home GP visits and I did catch every childhood ailment going: mumps, measles, chickenpox, you name it.

My lucky streak ended, however, in 1979, the year I turned nineteen. My mother died of cancer that June, having been increasingly ill for the previous eight months. I was still processing that when, in August, I had to take time off work (a chicken hatchery near my home in Fife) because I was suffering blinding headaches. The initial diagnosis was a migraine but the prescribed tablets didn’t help in the least. I ended up unable to get out of bed and, after my father’s traditional cure (a vinegar-soaked cloth on the forehead) proved ineffectual, a home visit by our GP led to a new diagnosis of meningitis.

I was rushed into hospital and given a lumbar puncture. Curled in the foetal position, I didn’t see the liquid spurt halfway across the room from my spinal column but the attendants assured me it was a spectacular display. (I dare say these days a phone might have captured the moment for internet posterity.) Along the way, I was also found to be giving a home to some form of salmonella bacteria. I was confined to a room of my own with a TV and radio, so once the various procedures had been dealt with I could relax and wait for the all-clear.

The nursing staff were great, lingering especially long if a good film was playing of an evening (Clint Eastwood was a favourite). I also recorded in my diary that my consultant would breeze in at daily intervals, do the crossword in my newspaper, then breeze out again, leaving me one less means of passing the time.

If the hospital was understaffed or under-resourced, everyone did a good job of hiding it from the patient. My father is long dead now, but thinking back, I do wonder at the stress and worry he must have felt in those few brief months. Me, I was young and bored, mostly. A friend sent a Snoopy book and Tolkien’s The Hobbit. Both sustained me in a way the Chaucer I was supposed to be studying (I was in the hinterland between first and second years at university) could not.

I was not to make much use of the NHS in the fifteen years that followed. However, in 1994 my son was born with special needs. He was our second child and at first we were fairly relaxed. We had read the parenting books and knew that infants developed at different rates. Finally, around the age of nine months, we had a diagnosis of Angelman Syndrome. Children’s hospitals and paediatric specialists became the norm for a time as he was tested and tested and tested again. There were seizures to be controlled and scoliosis (curvature of the spine) was yet one more problem to be factored in. The doctors and nurses got to know us and we got to know them.

Our son is in his mid-twenties now. He grew out of the seizures and the scoliosis did not worsen appreciably. But he cannot walk or feed himself or communicate, so whenever he is under the weather there are always more tests and procedures and tense waits for answers. Nor is he always the most accommodating client. It takes three of us to cajole and control him when his teeth need to have their regular examination, and dental procedures beyond a check-up require a hospital visit and general anaesthetic. It doesn’t help that he has arms like an octopus and an uncanny ability to notice and then attach his vice-like grip to the one thing in the room you wish he wouldn’t.

The people I’ve encountered in every area of the NHS have been professional, caring, empathetic and patient. The GP of Dr Finlay’s Casebook may be a thing of the past, but our GP practice in Edinburgh has always been there for us. The virus of 2020 has reminded us how much we depend on these professionals – from the hospital porters and cleaners right up to the most senior consultants and surgeons. They are ordinary people doing often extraordinary things. Those vinegar compresses – however well-meant – were not going to save my life and all the parental love in the world was not going to ameliorate my son’s condition. But the NHS did, and the NHS do.

And I know I’m by no means alone in being indebted to them.

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