"Amazing service at A and E at Durham Hospital"

Visiting Durham from Glasgow for a few days, I ended up at A & E at Durham Hospital yesterday early evening. I had gone over on my ankle and heard an ominous crack! Despite two full waiting rooms with a huge variety of patients all hoping to be seen quickly, the staff were wonderful, patient and pleasant even though they must have felt under a huge amount of pressure, given the numbers waiting and the waiting times to be seen.

After three hours I was seen by Steph, one of the specialist nurses, who quickly checked my ankle and sent me along the corridor to have an x-Ray which was carried out by Gill. Both Steph and Gil could not have been lovelier, caring, compassionate and explaining what was happening - and apologising for the delays which were clearly not caused by any of the staff.

The x Ray showed I had a fracture on the outside of my ankle and after speaking to the consultant who confirmed her judgement, Steph provided me with a boot (very attractive of course!), crutches, pain medication and very helpful advice (including how to use crutches, a new experience for me). She also arranged for me to have an appointment at the virtual fracture clinic this morning. As promised, Carol, an orthopaedic nurse, phoned me today and confirmed that my x-ray had been seen by Mr Gregory, one of the orthopaedic consultants. Fortunately he was happy to confirm it was a stable fracture and the treatment provided at A and E was what I needed. Carol also gave me further very useful advice and answered my questions fully. 

I have nothing but praise and admiration for the treatment I have received and would be very grateful if my thanks could be passed to Steph , Gill and all those working in A and E yesterday evening. They made what could have been a horrible situation as easy as possible, right down to one of the reception staff ordering me a taxi when I was ready to leave. And my thanks also to Carol for phoning to update me this morning, that was very reassuring. My trip to Durham has not been what I planned but without all these NHS staff it would have been so much worse. Thank you all!