I went for my regular diabetic clinic appointment on Monday.
On arrival I handed the nurse a full "sharps" box. Obviously this contains the needles I use daily to check my blood sugars as well as the bloody test strips. "Oh we don't take these, the County Council collect them from you"
"Sorry but not in Denbighshire they don't"
"Oh they do ~ here's a leaflet" and she hands me a poorly photocopied sheet of paper. The PPSofP has instructions for disposal of "Sharps" information:
"If you live in Conwy phone 1234 890765
If you live in Denbighshire phone 1345 0987654
If you live in Flintshire phone 4567 7654321
They will collect your full sharps box and replace it with a new one, (Apart from Denbighshire patients, who will need to take sharps boxes back to their GP surgery or clinic)" 
I then asked if I could have a bottle of the "Calibration Fluid" that I need to calibrate the blood sugar meter as I have run out. "Oh we don't do that here ~ I'll give you a new meter"
And hands me a box containing the full kit. I now have three of these but all I really need is a new bottle of the fluid to check that the meter is working correctly. Diabetics among you will know that this has to be done weekly or when one opens a new supply of test strips or you can get false readings. Once opened the little bottle of fluid has a shelf life of 3 months after which it can give false readings.
Anywhoo I carried my new device home and opened it. It doesn't work as it has a duff battery. I contacted the help desk number and they asked me to read the "Best Before" date in the box ~ Yup .... you guessed it. The hospital are issuing out of date equipment. IT is also a different model that does not need regular calibration and therefore contains no bottle of fluid.
I have been in touch with my GP this morning ..... he has offered me a prescription for yet another complete bloody Monitoring System.
