"My mum's treatment"

I would like to take this opportunity to give feedback about my Mum's recent hospital stay. She attended with chest pain.

She was taken to A&E by ambulance. Unfortunately she had an almost 4 hour wait in an ambulance before she was taken into A&E. In that time, she didn't have any monitoring or review. I suspect this was because her chest pain had settled, and so there was less urgency about monitoring, investigation and treatment.

At that point we didn't know she had actually had a significant heart attack. Had she managed to be seen in A&E quickly and not had to wait outside in the ambulance, the diagnosis would have been known about several hours before it was. No one is to blame for that, the delay reflected how busy the hospital was, and for anyone this was not ideal, but for an almost 90 year old it really isn't. 

I was not with her in A&E but another family member was, and from there on she was dealt with quickly and efficiently by the A&E staff. She was then admitted to CCU and stayed there for a few days. The nursing staff in CCU were lovely, kind and caring towards her. The junior doctors were excellent, we met her consultant a few times, and I would like to give him a special mention, Dr Akinlade. He was kind, and took time to explain things (really well), and I sensed he was doing his very best for her and she said he was a lovely man!

The contrast between the experience on arrival and the experience once the wheels actually got in motion was stark. It shows there is no lack of willingness on the part of any staff, but they simply need more resources and need patients to use the right services at the right time.