"Left feeling so frustrated"

After reading the story Failings in Patient Affairs in NHS Lanarkshire, and their comments, I too echo deep concerns about the timeframe and attitude that we faced when we raised a legitimate complaint with Patient Affairs regarding my cousin’s experience as an in-patient at Wishaw and then the discharge process.

The length of time from our initial contact to receiving a response was too long. In the interim, the miscommunications surrounding her formal discharge and the very slow response from Patient Affairs on our appeal for support and information, left the patient in much confusion, facing a difficult situation in agonising pain, and her family left feeling helpless and frustrated for some time, waiting on much-needed answers.

Adding to the long delays between receiving and responding to our queries on email or voicemail (they never seem to directly answer the phone), I’d also flag that Patient Affairs make outbound phone calls from a centralised general number which is registered to multiple branches of NHS Lanarkshire. In other words, when you receive a missed call, and no Voicemail is left (this happened more than once) there is no way of knowing for sure that it’s Patient Affairs trying to reach you. Of course in our experience, when you do call back, they don’t answer and it can be days before they try you again. This continued in cycles and it was distressing.

I admire the other author's perseverance, and commitment to enacting change. In the end our family was ground down by the inefficiency, lack of compassion and corporate mentality from the Patient Affairs team. We dealt directly with the team manager and her protection of Doctor and Hospital, even with papered evidence of misstep, was very disheartening. We felt it would be impossible to penetrate this wall of protectionism and encourage reflection and learnings to be taken forward.

We also felt patronised and belittled in some of the exchanges we had. In any situation I think this is inappropriate, but especially in the context of being employed to interact with unwell people and their families.

Our family chose to move on. I am truly sorry to read and reflect on the other author's experience, knowing others out there are also being left feeling so frustrated.

Patient Affairs on this site and elsewhere are billed as mediators, and resolution-focused staff, which would (you’d assume) include a readiness for efficiency and an attitude of neutrality and compassion. We did not find that from the Manager of this team.