"Recent Day Surgery"

I was in for day surgery to remove a lesion on my tongue and as you would appreciate was not something anyone would look forward to. Also the last time I had ever been in a hospital with general anesthetic was at the age of 5 so nearly 50 years later of course I was a little concerned.

Reason to type up on my experience is that it was absolutely excellent from start to finish. Of course there is a tendency in media these days to focus on the negatives of the NHS be if funding, recruitment challenges etc which are real but also we know there are far too many managers so it is the consultants and front line key staff I am referring to as they are the "real" front facing service providers. As a series of bullet points it was so professional as follows:

- Arrive in Ambulatory Care as required

- not long after my consultant Mr Mitchell personally came and got me and explained all that he would do and I would be in theater for a short time later in the morning.

- Then Julie the nurse running the area introduced herself and was excellent and the other Julie, including a third member of staff also with a name starting J which was amusing. They all put me at ease and just gave a level of professional reassurance.

- Then not long after the anesthetist came and introduced herself and explained what would happen.

I was taken through and all that was discussed happened and even on recovery the nurse was great and chatted away and was taken back to Ambulatory Care. Within only 20 minutes Mr Mitchell visited and confirmed what he has done and would see me again in 4-6 weeks.

At end Julie explained all and gave me pain killers, mouthwash etc and we chatted and then my wife picked me up around 2.45pm.

So from start to finish my experience of day surgery was outstanding. All procedures and form filling was smooth with lots of checks at all stages, but that aside it is the care provided by the clinical/nursing staff which was so impressive especially as I have not been in a hospital and had surgery for some time. As I said to Julie I hope to not see her again and all has managed to be cut out but this is a real team of professionals that the hospital should be proud of.