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As a visitor it is a very trying and...

Story from nhs.uk

"As a visitor it is a very trying and..."

About: Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Birmingham)

What I liked

Staff are generally friendly and the facilities seem good.

What could be improved

Ward 518 (which staff on CDU refer to as the 'Elderly Care Unit', and which does seem so, given the ages of the patients on that ward) is as far from the Main Entrance as it is possible to get. Given that many of the visitors to this ward are also elderly, this is a major problem. My 90-year old uncle will not be visiting his wife tomorrow because he is physically exhausted after several days' visiting. It is occasionally possible to get him a visitor wheelchair so that I can wheel him the length of the 5th floor corridor (which is about 0.25km long), but often they are all in use or being sat on by patients smoking outside the Main Entrance. Would it not be possible for there to be an entrance at the other end of the complex, so that we could park in Car Park D and ascend up to near Ward 518? As well as wheelchairs being in short supply, the lifts at the Main Entrance end of the building are a bottle neck at the start of visiting hours, so providing an alternative entrance might alleviate this problem too.Car ParkCorridorsWheelchairsElderly careVisiting times

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Responses

Response from Queen Elizabeth Hospital 13 years ago
Queen Elizabeth Hospital

Submitted on 16/02/2011 at 11:23
Published on nhs.uk on 17/02/2011 at 04:00

Thank you for taking the time to provide feedback on your experience at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham. We welcome all feedback and would like to assure you that all comments are taken seriously and acted upon as part of our ongoing commitment to improving patient experience.

We are pleased to hear that you found our staff friendly and our new facilities good. However, we were concerned to read about your uncle's experience of visiting one of our wards. We would welcome the opportunity to discuss your suggestions and take action to ensure that future patients do not have such a struggle to visit their loved ones.

Please contact the Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) to discuss this further. You can contact PALS by phone 0121 371 3280, by email PALS@uhb.nhs.uk , via the hospital website http://www.uhb.nhs.uk/pals-form.htm or in person by dropping in between 10-4pm (Mon-Fri) to the PALS office located to the left of the Information Desk in the main entrance of the new Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham.

Thank you again for taking the trouble to post your comments on the NHS Choices website.

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