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Quite a confusing experience for me

Posted By snowtk21

"Quite a confusing experience for me"

About: Musgrove Park Hospital / Paediatrics

(as a service user),

I felt that the staff were generally good at looking after my child's immediate medical needs but for a paediatric ward they often didn't address them as a child or take time to explain what was happening to them in an age appropriate way.

As parents we had to try and explain what would happen during the proposed scans/tests. Some (not all-some were clearly run off their feet) of the nursing staff appeared completely disinterested and unavailable when needed but could be seen sitting around talking to colleagues.

Information provided in the rooms appeared to be contradictory to what actually happened on the ward making it quite a confusing experience for me. The uniforms were also confusing making it hard to tell which staff had which roles (unlike at other hospitals I have visited where posters clearly identify staff uniforms and roles).

Communication with us as to what was happening/what the diagnosis might be was quite limited and our understanding of what was wrong relied on us asking questions. Breakfast was supposed to be brought between 7-8 but my child was never asked if they would like anything to eat before 8.30 (for some reason this seemed to be down to nurses rather than HCA's as I've experienced elsewhere) and then took time as other things cropped up on the ward. There was no way I could sort this for my child myself and didn't make the experience more tolerable for my child.

Overall I felt that some of the staff were doing their absolute best given limitations and the play support was a surprising and valuable addition to a child's experience. It just rather like an adult ward, focused on medical necessity rather than one aimed at giving children the most positive experience of what could be a fairly traumatic time which I had imagined a paediatric ward might have more focus on.

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Responses

Response from Dr Holly Mincher, Paediatric speciality doctor in training, Paediatrics, Somerset NHS Foundation Trust 13 months ago
We are preparing to make a change
Dr Holly Mincher
Paediatric speciality doctor in training, Paediatrics,
Somerset NHS Foundation Trust

Submitted on 17/03/2023 at 19:44
Published on Care Opinion on 18/03/2023 at 08:07

picture of Dr Holly Mincher

Dear Snowtk21

My name is Dr Holly and I am one of the members of the Paediatric team who reviews patient and family feedback.

I would firstly like to thank you for the time you have given to share your experience about your son’s stay with us. We are hugely appreciative of your feedback as it helps us greatly to improve our ongoing care.

Tailoring our care, support and interactions with our children, young people and their families during their time with us on the children’s unit are hugely important to us and I apologise you and your child did not experience this during your recent time with our team. I am pleased to hear from you that our Play team were able to enhance your son’s experience during his admission - the play specialists are highly valued members of our team.

On behalf of the Children’s unit, I sincerely apologise for the difficulties you experienced during your son’s admission. It has saddened me to hear you did not experience the care and support we aim to provide for our patients and families.

When your child was admitted to hospital it would have been a hugely worrying time for you all, with further distress and understandable confusion experienced from a lack of clear and child friendly explanations given about your son’s treatment and information about the ward and its staff members.

We have taken your feedback extremely seriously and your feedback was shared immediately with Dr Gita Modgil (our Associate Medical Director of Paediatrics), Suzy Mason (our Matron) and Caroline Jackson (our senior Ward Manger). Our team explored your feedback on the same day with colleagues on our unit and together we would very much like to address and improve our services based upon your feedback.

Going forward, we shall share your story wider together with our clinical teams. We shall actively reinforce the importance of communicating with all our patients and young people in an age appropriate manner. We shall also endorse the importance of remaining consistently attentive and as prompt as possible to meet the needs of our patients and family’s needs during their stay. Currently, we are exploring and updating ways to improve how we provide information about the children’s unit in a clearer, more accurate and accessible manner, adapting this to reach all ages of children and young people as well as their families and carers. We can update you of the changes made via Care Opinion. If you, or your child, would like to actively be involved with these changes we would be delighted to work together with you.

Finally, we would very much like to have a further conversation with you to explore your experiences further and any ideas that you may have to improve our care. Should you wish to contact us please email our Matron and unit manager directly via Suzy.Mason@somersetFT.nhs.uk or Caroline.Jackson@somersetFT.nhs.uk.

Again, thank you for your feedback, we truly do appreciate you sharing your story with us.

Yours sincerely

Dr Holly Mincher

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Response from Dr Holly Mincher, Paediatric speciality doctor in training, Paediatrics, Somerset NHS Foundation Trust 11 months ago
We have made a change
Dr Holly Mincher
Paediatric speciality doctor in training, Paediatrics,
Somerset NHS Foundation Trust

Submitted on 30/05/2023 at 18:30
Published on Care Opinion at 19:53

picture of Dr Holly Mincher

Dear Snowtk21

I am writing to update you on what we have done so far to improve our care in the Children’s unit following your feedback.

After sharing your feedback with the Managerial team we have re-established daily ‘Ward Safety Huddles’. These are meetings which allow staff members to share information including parental concerns to improve situational awareness and disseminate learning across the department. We are also able to generate real time solutions and resolutions during these meetings. In response to your feedback, we have emphasised the importance of child focused care and ensuring communication is consistently optimal.

If you would like to learn more about this improvement please do contact our unit Manager, Caroline Jackson via email, Caroline.Jackson@somersetFT.nhs.uk. We would be very happy and willing to explain about this in more detail.

I would like to thank you again for the time you gave sharing your experiences of your stay with us – it provided such valuable learning and helped us move forward to make those necessary changes to provide the excellent care for patients and their families we always strive for.

Yours sincerely

Dr Holly

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