"Male Surgical Ward Stay"

I have been in and out of hospital over the past number of years. I was in Craigavon years ago for surgery and had a stoma bag fitted. The consultant I met was excellent and did everything that they could for me however, there was an area which was very painful around the stoma. In the years since I have been on strong painkillers to help deal with the pain and that was all ok. Then one day a couple weeks ago, I noticed I wasn't quite myself so I was brought up to the hospital, it was then discovered that I had a severe kidney infection. I was placed on different antibiotics but neither of them worked. After the doctors carried out many tests including a bone marrow sample, it was unearthed that the antibiotics where not working due to the amount of morphine in my system due to the pain killers.

Since I came in the staff have helped me to come up with a plan to gradually decrease the amounts of pain medication I need. I also didn't know that I could get any form of domestic help until the nurses informed me of all the services that I could access and helped me to set up a care package.

I have nothing to complain about as the nurses are amazing and wonderful however I feel that their wages should reflect the work that they put into their jobs. I also think that they should have set hours rather than a changing weekly schedule and the hospital should make more permanent positions.

I also feel that the nurses and doctors deserve to be treated better than they are by some patients because of how much they sacrifice for our care.