"elderly care at royal Hampshire county hospital."

Yet again, my faith in the care offered to the elderly at the Royal Hampshire County hospital has been tested. My grandfather is currently at the hospital after a fall, we visit him regularly, and drove down to see him on Sunday. We went to kemp welch ward to find his bed empty and his belongings gone, When we asked a nurse where he had gone, we were met with a blank stare, even though the we had spoken to the same nurse on a number of occasions. She remembered him, but had no clue as to his current whereabouts. After checking the ward diary, it transpired he was last in the ward on the thursday, but no notes had been left after that. The nurse then checked the computer records, thinking she had found him, but this turned out to be another gentleman with the same surname.

We were then told it appeared he had been transferred back to Andover hospital, but on ringing them to confirm this ,she was told he was not with them. After a bit more computer digging, they finally found that he was at another ward in Winchester all along. So despite having various numbers to call us on, nobody had bothered to ring us to let us know he had been moved.

As well as this debacle, the hospital seems to have trouble providing my elderly grandfather with the general care and compassion he deserves. Little or no attention seems to be paid to the patients general personal hygiene or appearance - despite us providing grandad with many items of clothing, he seems to be left in a hospital gown the majority of the time, when encouragement/help should be offered to get him dressed.

We then move on to the general cleanliness of the hospital, in the last two visits there were a used surgical glove in one of the lifts, a patient trolley left in a corridor that had a thick layer of dust cover, visitor toilets that did not flush and a number of antibacterial hand wash pumps that were empty.

All in all my experiences of this hospital are unfavourable. And im so looking forward to my grandad being transferred back to Andover as soon as possible, as I believe the care and attention to detail offered at Winchester is simply unacceptable. It's such a shame that the once great hospital, I myself, was born in, seems to be doing so miserably.