"Mistakes with elective surgery system"

I am on the list for elective surgery for a procedure that I need done annually to manage bladder incontinence.  I call Fiona Stanley hospital and let them know that I need to get the procedure done soon as I am becoming more incontinent.  In my experience, Spinal Urology is great and got me on to the elective waiting list people at Fremantle hospital who booked me in with a week's notice to the FSH  for a day procedure.

I have done pre-admission on the phone and received the letter with instructions and confirmed the day before with the waitlist people that I will be attending. 

I turn up on the day to the Ward indicated on the letter and they are not expecting me but they seem to find out that I am meant to be there and get me a room and start getting ready. A couple of times I'm checked in on and givin' questions to confirm I have been fasting etc- the standard admission stuff.  About 3 hours after my arrival I am starting to worry and want to know when I'm going into the day surgery unit.  4 hours after my arrival a nurse is on the phone and they tell me that I am not on the list with the  Surgeon and that they are not expecting me and so we decide I should just go home.

I had been fasting all day and taken a day off work.  My partner's workday was interrupted by having to drop me off and pick me up.  I felt like a fool for waiting so long and angry that nurses were wasting time on me for no reason. It is really difficult for me to find a day I can take off work so easily.

I felt frustrated that the communication between different parts of the system was, in my opinion, so bad that this could happen. Apparently, there was one part of the system which was missed which meant that although I got all the official letters, FSH and the Surgeon didn't. I feel frustrated and angry that staff on the Ward I was on are, as I understand it, used to not always being told patients were coming in for day surgery, so didn't check I was on the Surgeon list.