Hi Veronica,
I'm so sorry to hear you had such a bad time with your gastroscopy. I did too - and if it's any consolation I don't live in the UK, so it wasn't done under the NHS.
I fully understand how angry and violated you feel. I felt the same way. I'm not in any way dismissing your outrage - or my own - but perhaps it would help if I explained how so-called conscious sedation works (and very occasionally doesn't). I'm a former nurse, btw.
There's an inherent potential flaw in the process of conscious sedation, which only affects a tiny minority of people who undergo it. The clue is in the word "conscious". Although most people who undergo endoscopy or any other procedure under sedation come out of it with no memory whatever, they remain fully conscious throughout the procedure. The medication takes just takes away the memory. If you don't remember something, it's as if you didn't experience it.
Others do retain hazy memories of the procedure when the sedation wears off, but were sufficiently calmed by the drugs administered that they were able to accept the procedure.
However, a lot of us struggle during gastroscopy, especially under sedation. I did too. It took six people to hold me down. (Though I have to say mine wasn't a straightforward gastroscopy.) And some of us have a paradoxical reaction to the sedation. It damps down our higher intellectual centres, leaving the more primitive "fight or flight" impulses in the driving seat. That's certainly what happened to me.
In these cases the staff continue with the procedure, restraining the patient if necessary, not because they're being deliberately cruel but because they "know" the patient will recall none of this afterwards so will not be traumatised by it. Quite understandably, their aim is to complete the procedure, so they can find out what's wrong with the patient, in order to be able to help.
Unfortunately, in an insignificant minority of us, the cocktail of drugs we're given completely fails to remove our memories of the event. The medical and nursing staff have no way of knowing this will happen at the time they're forcibly completing the procedure. This, combined with a violent struggle on the part of the patient, results in the emotional trauma you experienced.
I'd like to stress to anyone else reading this post that the combination of a paradoxical reaction and full retention of memory of the event is very rare indeed, particularly in the under-65s, who are always given a full dose of sedation. It's slightly more common in over-65s (my case) who are only ever given a half-dose.
If you ever have to have a gastroscopy again, I'd urge you to opt just for the throat spray, without sedation. If you can't tolerate it and start struggling then, the medical staff will know you mean it and will not continue, as this would constitute an assault. Either that, or insist on a GA. I think I'd go the latter route, as I live in a country where I can easily do this (although I'd have to pay the cost of the anaesthetic myself). I used to believe this wasn't available under the NHS, but I've seen a couple of posts on these boards where British patients have been able to insist on a GA.
Once again, you have all my sympathy and understanding for the way you're feeling right now. But the medical staff weren't being cruel and arrogant, they genuinely believed at the time that you would remember nothing of these events and would just come out of it with a sore throat. And the sense of violation does wear off. My experience happened three years ago and I've long since stopped having nightmares about it.
And again, to any others contemplating gastroscopy under sedation: don't worry about this. Only a tiny handful of patients have an unpleasant experience.