FOR someone who can never resist magazines or books with titles that ask Is that Lump Malignant? or Could Your Rash be a Killer?, I have spent very little time in hospital.

The truth is, I don't like hospitals. When I was in my teens I imagined all hospital medics would look like Dr Kildare and be madly in love with those slim, pretty young nurses with radiant smiles and Doris Day hairdos. After all, many of my friends wanted to be nurses for that very reason.

This, of course, was in the glory days of the NHS when there were matrons, not managers, and people came to have their tonsils out or ingrowing toenails removed, not for heart transplants or gender changes.

It was a time when patients arrived with dressing gowns and slippers and stayed a week, or even longer, of convalescence after an operation or giving birth.

Today, when a bed is far from being guaranteed, it's probably advisable to keep the meter running on a waiting cab while you have your parts removed or adjusted.

It's a different matter, of course, it you're an out patient, hoping to be seen by a doctor. Then you know why you're called patient. It's a God-given opportunity to finish War and Peace or knit a bedjacket... just in case.

But first, get your appointment for that initial consultation. Mine took just under six months to arrive, but then a broken toe is hardly classed as terminal or an emergency. It still hurts though.

Ithink what I hate most about hospitals is the smell, a mixture of disinfectant and what we'll call "something else" - even in areas such as the fracture clinic, where you wouldn't think incontinence would be a problem.

Iarrived early clutching a guide book to Texas (a big state for a long wait), two Kit-Kats and an apple. I should have packed a Thermos of coffee laced with Jack Daniels. Or better still, forget the coffee.

First the X-ray and then a wait in a room which filled with people who looked as if they might well have enjoyed a too-close relationship with Mr Daniels. They limped, they staggered, they stumbled and jerked, feet, arms, legs, necks encased in plaster, some with sticks, others on crutches, wheelchair brushed against wheelchair.

It never sprains but it falls, I thought.

Ibegan to feel a bit of a fraud. I had nothing that showed my legitimate reason for being there - my deformed toe was hidden from sight.

The minutes ticked by until an hour had passed. Names were called, people lurched off or were wheeled in the direction of consulting rooms, while I continued to sit and wait.

Iate the Kit-Kats and the apple, read about cowboy boot-making in Texas (wouldn't do much business around here I thought), fidgeted, scratched and noticed a nurse writing something on a chart on the opposite wall.

Glasses on. It was list of names, names of the doctors we were due to see - Mr Tibia, Miss Femur, Dr Tendon. Next to the names were numbers - 45, 60, 35. "Minutes late," the nurse explained.

Eventually, my name was called. "You'll need an operation," said the doctor, looking at the toe. "We'll put you on the waiting list."

"How long?" I murmured.

"About a year," he replied.

"Should I bring my slippers.. ?" I asked. But he'd already gone.

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