To be quite honest this story horrifies me as we will be going there in less than 2 weeks with 2 children

She'll be home tomorrow, I will post full details on here as soon as I get them. I will point out that she said her apartments were beautiful, she had no problem with them at all, or the location, it was just the total lack of help after her mums accident that she is upset about.
Ellie

Yes, the "self-care" system is completely normal in Greece, so your friend and her mum have not experienced anything out of the ordinary I'm afraid. Families and friends of patients are expected to provide all non-medical care and food.
As for what assistance should or would be provided by holiday reps I suppose that depends on the particular tour operator but in my experience it would be next to nothing
Hope your friend's mum has a relitavely comfortable journey home and makes a good and quick recovery.

Just to reiterate what Retsina has said about self care, yes it is completely normal in Greece. The medical care that is required is provided and is usually excellent but the family is responsible for everything else.

As to the Reps, she should complain now! They should have been there to help and offer advice. I wouldn't expect them to arrange care for children but normally they will arrange a transfer for a person to be close to the hospital and find someone who can translate forms etc. Most reps don't appear to have much knowledge of the language of whatever country they end up in these days. It is probably a rogue rep because when I have travelled on packages and someone has been unfortunate to end up in hospital, the reps have always seemed to do a decent job.

Thank you for your replies, I appreciate you responding so quickly
I don't think she has a problem at all with the medical care that has been given, it is the appalling attitude of the rep and the fact that the hospital staff made no effort to try and make them feel comfortable as foreigners that she is upset about. Oh well, I guess I'll get all the details tomorrow!
Thanks again guys
Ellie

I had also heard that in Greece all you get is medical care - anything else is left up to relatives. What happens if you are travelling on your own??

I was unfortunate enough to experience the A&E dept. in Madeira last November after breaking my ankle. A horrendous experience - husband could not stay with me, language problems and a not very clean hospital. Needless to say that once I was put in plaster I took the decision to return home for surgery despite the surgeons wishes to operate immediately! We were on a diy holiday so had no rep to help out. We love Greece but for the moment this experience has put me off certain countries - we are now re-discovering Spain!

Hope everything goes well for the return flight home. I expect like me all she wants is to get back home.

Pippa

Hi Eloisa..
Pass on all our best wishes to your friends mum..

I must admit i thought this was a wonderful way to care for relatives and shows the strong familly bonds & life in Greece. Care and food is supplied by relatives and i guess what we think is the norm in hospital must seem as strange to the Greeks as their ways to us.. Let the Hospital do what they do best and let the family do their caring.. ..

Seems the reps have let your friends down here with the lack of information. Even if they dont speak the language surely they could have called into the hotel and got an English speaking Greek to explain the system. Maybe they should switch their party heads off and read up on the resorts their looking after..

paul..

Well they are home safe now, had a 2 hour delay on the way back which didn't improve my mates temper much lol
The steps that her mum slipped on were marble ones leading from the lounge area up to their room, apparently as of this morning there was still blood on the staircase (she did this last friday)
They received no help at all from the rep involved (I don't want to mention what TO on here until I have their permission to do so) and nobody at the hospital took any time to explain how their care system worked. The hospital was about 20 minutes from the apts they were staying in so it cost my friend a fair bit getting to and from the hospital from friday when it happened to sunday night when they let her mum out.
They then had to go back on the Monday to pick up some medication that wasn't available on the sunday, and again on wednesday to get her safe to fly certificate. Please bear in mind that she does, as I have previously mentioned, have 2 young children to take around with her as well.
It is such a terrible shame that this has happened to them, the whole idea of them going away was that my friend has had a truly awful year so far, this was supposed to be her bit of "time out" before she came back to regroup after her most recent problems.
I am disgusted at the way they have been dealt with by their TO, I know if it had happened to me I would be screaming blue murder!
Thanks for all the replies, from me and on behalf of my friend
Ellie

I think what she have experienced is unforgivable on the tour operator side of things, on the self-care side of things, I agree with wudjacudja, a lot of hospitals in different places around the world offer this system and I think it is lovely as long as you can cope, if I was in hospital i would rather have my family around me to help rather than strangers dealing with my needs.

But being not from Greece and being with a TO they should have offered full help and assistance and I think they were probably negligable by not doing so although i dont know your terms and conditions.

I hope she recovers well and quickly and I hope your friend gets another break soon to get some well earned rest.

Hi
I was reading another forum a few days back and thinking about this experience of the friends and to be honest it's unusual that no Greeks stepped in to help. My experience of Zante and Laganas of all places has been such that hotel / apartment owners have always gone out of their way to help.

This is a bar owner helping a customer collect a prescription.. Admitedly Alykes / kanas but, very typical of the Zakynthinians as hosts.

I must thank you again for fetching my prescription for me from Katastari

http://www.forums.zanteweb.gr/showthread.php?s=&postid=31036#post31036

And myself last year not having suffered from hayfever for a few years our apartment was further inland and i was getting sore eyes. Kostas our apartment owner offered to drive me to his local pharmacy to collect some. I declined the help because he was very busy so he wrote a note for the chemist which was very helpful.

Naming and shaming all parties involved so we can avoid them would be a course of action or even advising the TO so they can update their information for reps & Hotels who may not be Greek owners themselves.

paul..