"Waiting times in A&E are a joke 14 hours with..."

Dear Michael,

I am truly sorry for your experience. I have asked the team to provide some detail about their current operational state and their reply is offered below.

On behalf of the entire Emergency Department, I would like to sincerely apologise to you Mr Thompson for your poor patient experience.

During April when you visited, we had a very challenging time, particularly during the out of hours period, owing to an acute phase of staff shortages, both Nursing and Medical.

However, this does not excuse the long delay waiting to see a nurse and then subsequently a Doctor. As a team, we take time to reflect on patient’s feedback in order to ensure wider learning for all staff and this is something that certainly our Head of Nursing will be picking up to ensure incidents such as this do not repeat themselves.

As healthcare professionals, we recognise the importance of hydration regardless of the circumstances and the fact that on this occasion we failed to adhere to our high standards is something the entire team will learn from and scrutinise as we move forward.

Please accept the apologies of the team for your difficult experience and I hope you will not hesitate to make contact again were you to require ED services or had any difficulties whatever. Often we can resolve problems sooner if you contact us while you are here, the patient experience team is able to respond to calls here Monday to Friday 10am to 4pm and you can leave a message outside of this time and we will respond.