"Nurses and paramedics are worth their weight in..."

I had to call an ambulance to assist with a fall my 16 yr old daughter had playing football Friday evening. The paramedics could not have been a nicer crew, keeping her reassured, making her laugh and keeping her as pain free as possible, the whole time informing her of their every move. We arrived at QEH very calm and sat in A&E for our turn to see triage and a doctor. It was a busy night, and understood that we weren't a major incident so sat waiting patiently. If fewer people had taken more responsibility for their visits, i.e. a patient that forgot to order an inhaler, we'd have been seen a little quicker.

After nearly 9 hrs we left, daughter was in a plaster cast, pain was manageable and we had an appointment for this morning in the fracture clinic, so all was ok. On leaving the hospital, one of the paramedics we'd had help us earlier came over to check my daughter was ok. The paramedic took time out to chat, said how pleased thy were that my daughter was on her way to being fixed and went back to work.

This morning we arrived and didn't have to wait more than half an hour to see the consultant. Again we were happy. We went through to the plaster room to have a brace fitted instead of a plaster cast, which my daughter was so upset about. She understands why she had this but was absolutely gutted as she has prom next weekend!!!

She had a few tears and we left with an appointment to see the consultant in 8 weeks, grateful that it wasn't worse! Later today I had a call from the nurse that fitted her brace, to check she was ok, worried about how upset she was and gave us a bit of advise to help her prom dress fit with the brace. Yes it's a vain thing to worry about but it's a big deal to a 16 yr old girl!! But how lovely that the nurse cared enough to call me! I don't know the names of the paramedics or the nurse today, but jeez what a truly lovely bunch. I cannot thank them enough. It's the little touches that made such a huge difference. These guys and gals aren't paid anywhere near enough, or thanked.

So cheers lovely people, it really was much appreciated x