A GRANDFATHER was discharged from East Surrey Hospital with a broken neck and sent home to exercise, his family have claimed.
Alfred Hollands, 87, was shopping in Redhill on February 5 when he fell and hit his head, leaving him with severe facial injures.
But despite his complaints of neck pain, doctors at East Surrey Hospital allegedly sent him home after stitching him up and X-raying his shoulder.
After four days of excruciating pain, Mr Hollands' family called an ambulance and he was rushed back to the hospital in Canada Avenue, Earlswood.
A second X-ray showed he had broken two vertebrae in his neck.
Recalling the first visit to hospital, his son Graham Hollands, of Wither Dale, Horley, said: "They examined my father and initially got him a neck brace, but they never put it on.
"You think to yourself 'what have we got to do?'
"We were saying this is an elderly man with a nasty head injury.
"They gave him neck exercises to do – if he had done them, I fear it could have damaged his spinal cord."
He added: "He is still in hospital now, he won't be coming out for quite a long time."
Mr Hollands says his father's problems did not end with a correct diagnosis.
As doctors recognised his broken neck, they also discovered he had suffered a minor stroke at some point.
Then, days later, as he lay on a ward, he says a nurse accidentally ripped out his catheter as she tried to move his bed.
Mr Hollands Sr, of Chequers Drive, Horley, is now recovering at Caterham Dene Hospital, but his son says the experience has taken its toll on him.
"He is doing as well as can be expected," he told the Mirror on Tuesday.
"It is quite sad just watching him. He is learning to walk again.
"He is proud today because he was able to walk to the dinner table with a Zimmer frame."
He added: "One thing that gets me is my father is 87, he drives, he's fit, but when he was in [East Surrey] hospital they were saying 'he must always find things tough'.
"It really grates me."
But he says the hospital transfer was not a smooth transition either.
On the morning of February 27, after his father had a scan at East Surrey Hospital, Mr Hollands junior was told he would be transferred to Caterham Dene.
At 9pm that night he had still not arrived.
After a series of concerned phone calls, Mr Hollands discovered his father had been lying on a bed in the departure area of East Surrey Hospital most of the day, waiting for an ambulance.
"He had been just laying there," he said.
"He was not a well man."
Mr Hollands paid tribute to the standard of care his father received after transferring to Caterham Dene Hospital.
The family has begun complaint proceedings against East Surrey Hospital.
The hospital said it would investigate the case once its medical director received details of the complaint.
