A father who has needed to go to hospital 13 times within a three month period is still waiting for a diagnosis.
Aaron Sutton, who has type 1 diabetes, has suffered from chest and stomach pains which have prevented him from working and caused strain on his ability to look after his five-year-old son.
The frustrated dad says every time he has gone to his local hospital the accident and emergency department have sent him home.
The 30-year-old claims doctors have told him that his symptoms are caused by anxiety, but Aaron has disputed the diagnosis.
Aaron says he has never had anxiety and feels A&E doctors are not listening to his concerns.
The Amazon driver, from Blurton, has put in a complaint with the patient advice and liaison services (PALS) for the Royal Stoke University Hospital.
Aaron told Stoke-on-Trent Live : “I’m type 1 diabetic and, three months ago, I had a really bad hypo.
“Since then, I’ve been feeling really unwell. There’s something definitely going on with my stomach or my chest and at one point I was coughing up blood.
“I’m getting all these different symptoms and something is causing it. I’m struggling to eat or drink some days and one day I felt like I was having an out of body experience.
“On numerous occasions, I’ve had an ambulance out.
“The first time I went to A&E they did blood tests on me and x-rayed my stomach as I was really bloated. They also did a CT scan of my chest.
“When they did these tests, they couldn’t find anything so they sent me home.
“In the space of three months, I’ve been to A&E 13 times in total. I was there waiting for 12 hours one day and they sent me home again.
“On another day, I also went up in the morning and again in the afternoon.
“Then when I went a couple of days ago, the doctor asked what was going on and they were trying to put it down to anxiety.
“But I don’t suffer with anxiety. I’ve never been anxious about anything in my life.
“When they said anxiety that made me feel 10 times worse, I feel like no one is listening to me. Just playing the anxious card.
“I’ve started crying up there because I’m mentally drained, getting no help, no support.
“I’m not the sort of person to ring an ambulance or go to A&E that many times for no reason. Normally I’m fine if I’m ill, I’ll just stay at home and deal with it, but I don’t feel right.
“I need to be on a ward. I don’t feel well, I know my own body, I wouldn’t keep going there for the sake of it.
“I feel like something is going to happen to me.”
Aaron says he is unable to go back to work and is struggling to care for his son due to his ill health.
He added: “It’s concerning and it’s affecting my five-year-old because he is worried about me. It’s affecting his mental health because he’s been crying, worrying about daddy.
“I’m struggling with money. My mum and nan have had to financially support me and I’ve had to sign on ESA because I’m not well enough to go back to work.
“It’s really impacting my mental health, I feel really down. I said to the doctors that I wanted to do myself in and they were concerned about me then.
“It’s like they are waiting for me to be really ill before they’ll do something about it.
“I’ve put in a complaint to PALS. I know there is lot’s of stuff going on with covid, but with my experience at the moment, there is a lack of care and understanding. They’re not listening, that’s the big thing, they’re not listening to patients.
“I could be really ill and my five-year-old could end up without a dad.
“I’m desperate for a diagnosis. I’m really struggling with it all.”
Royal Stoke bosses say it is always their aim to ‘deliver the highest standards of care possible’.
Ann-Marie Riley, chief nurse at University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust, said: “We are very sorry to hear of Aaron’s situation. It is always our aim to deliver the highest standards of care possible.
“We do take any complaint or concerns raised by patients or their families very seriously and we would encourage Aaron to let us know and speak to the Patient Advice and Liaison Team who can investigate and provide support.”
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