Doctor sparks row on social media after suggesting Princess Kate would have been sent home within a day if she had been treated by the NHS

A doctor sparked a row on social media today by suggesting Princess Kate could have been thrown out of an NHS hospital within a day.

Prolific

Taking to the platform, formerly known as Twitter, he said: ‘Kate will remain in hospital for up to fourteen days following her operation.

‘In the meantime, you will have surgery on the NHS and be sent home 1 to 2 days later.’

Dr. Mike, as he is known on social media, said discharged patients would also receive a “picture of what the wound infection looks like and maybe one wound dressing.”

The Princess of Wales, 42, is recovering in hospital after a planned abdominal operation on Tuesday at the London Clinic in Marylebone.

It is understood that her condition is ‘non-cancerous’.

But exact details have not been released by Kensington Palace, which announced the shocking news yesterday. A source told the Mail that Kate is ‘doing well’.

She will remain in the private hospital for about a fortnight and will be given time to recover at home.

Kate has canceled her planned appointments and foreign trips and is unlikely to resume her public duties until after Easter.

Dr. Mike, who claimed to have worked for the NHS in the past, was immediately branded ‘irresponsible’ for making light of the princess’s condition.

One user said: ‘A professional doctor, unaware of the exact details or nature of the Princess of Wales’ diagnosis, would not use the trauma of one patient to score childish and purely speculative political points about the treatment of others.’

Meanwhile, another wrote: ‘How irresponsible of you as a doctor to discredit a patient when you don’t know what treatment and care she needs.’

However, the doctor clarified his concerns about how the health care system often discharges patients “when they would likely benefit from a longer stay.”

He added: ‘Many people with serious illness or post-operatively are sent home too quickly.

‘I see them returning to the emergency department several hours later, sometimes extremely unwell.’

Each hospital has its own discharge policy, but under general guidelines patients should be checked twice a day to see if they can go home.

Even after major surgery, hospital chiefs are instructed to assess whether patients should still be in hospital after about three days.

Discharge times relate to the issue of bed blockers – the term used to describe patients who are in a hospital bed and do not strictly need them.

Some patients stay in the department for months.

This is usually because the NHS has failed to organize the next stage of their care, making it unsafe to discharge them.

In a second tweet hours later, after it was revealed that King Charles would be taking a short break from his duties to treat an enlarged prostate, Dr Mike said: ‘How strange that Kate reveals she is in hospital and it breaking news and then within minutes the king announces that he is getting prostate treatment and now he is the top story.

“No one puts Baby in the corner, I guess.”

In response to his tweet, Dr Katie Cairns, who claims to be a GP in Belfast, agreed that ‘something strange is going on’ and accused the Palace of creating ‘a distraction’.

While The Palace won’t reveal details about Kate’s ‘medical privacy’‘, it did not rule out that she would choose to speak about it publicly in the future.

Writing for the Daily Mai, GP Dr Martin Scurr said: ‘These days it is becoming increasingly rare for you to need to recover in hospital for up to two weeks, even in a private hospital.

‘But it is reassuring that this was a planned operation and not an emergency.

‘This would have minimized the possibility of unwanted complications.’

Elective However, abdominal surgery in women in their early 40s is “quite uncommon,” he noted.

But it could also be an appendectomy, gallstones or a hysterectomy. Ovarian cysts also require surgical removal, he added.

“Surgery is sometimes necessary to repair a hernia, and even young, fit, muscular women can develop them,” he said.

Kate’s return to official duties will depend on medical advice closer to the time, but she is not expected to return to public events until after Easter.