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"Rheumatic diseases unit"

About: Fife Community Services / Rheumatology

(as a service user),

This was once an amazing service but sadly no more. Staff apathy and lack of listening skills has meant that care level has dropped significantly.

I have been under the care of this service since it's foundation. I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Disease in the early 1990s, at this time there was no Rheumatology Service in Fife and as such I was under the care of Edinburgh based consultants. When the Fife Rheumatic Diseases Unit was formed the level of care, patient interaction, great consultants that took particular care to listen and indeed act on patient input was absolutely astonishing, representing healthcare for a very complex suit of diseases at its pinnacle.


Sadly in recent years the service has diminished significantly and for some patients, myself included has become an invisible service and even when called on by other specialists consultants for input to complications surrounding this broad range of Auto-Immune disorders seem unable to make timeous responses or indeed make any form of response without multiple requests to do so. This is a serious drop in basic standards and is not acceptable for people who suffer with chronic pain, depression and destruction of body tissues due to the disease. Delays in the correct diagnosis and therefore treatments have a great potential to allow unnecessary pain, suffering and damage to not only the patients but to their families.

I think this department truly needs to take an inward look at themselves and how they can perhaps learn lessons from the past, a start may be by employing people that will show a genuine interest in their patients rather than treating them indifferently and going through the motions (eventually) with them as I have experienced.

As a patient of this department since it's formation in 1994 it saddens me to make this response. Even sadder is the fact that many of the other specialists involved with my treatment for a suite of complex medical conditions are also aghast at the state that this once incredible service has fallen into, some of whom have expressed frustration at the lack of responses from them, some a level of frustration as the lack of communication has meant that they are having to hold back on treatments for conditions that may (or may not) wish to proceed with.

This situation has become quite apparent for a number of years. Unfortunately they seem to have run the service down to the very poor offering we now have in 2022.

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Responses

Response from Louise Noble, Service Manager, Planned Care, NHS Fife 3 years ago
We are preparing to make a change
Louise Noble
Service Manager, Planned Care,
NHS Fife
Submitted on 24/02/2022 at 13:11
Published on Care Opinion at 13:31


I am so sorry that your experience with the rheumatology department has left you feeling unhappy with the care you have received/are receiving. It is the aim of the whole team to offer the best, person centred care possible each time. The last few years have brought challenges to the service with a number of the staff supporting inpatient services over the COVID 19 pandemic. This has undoubtedly led to response times not always being what we would strive for.

I would be very keen to discuss your concerns further if you would be agreeable to that. Should you wish to do so our patient relations department can assist with arranging this.

Once again I truly apologise for your experience and I am keen to work with you in improving it.

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Update posted by S05 (a service user)

I would of course be happy to discuss this further but only if anoninimity can be

guaranteed. I request this as the CareOpinion feedback site is to allow just that, anonimity.

I would perhaps like to clarify matters a little further in this response, I am acutely aware that the past couple of years have indeed presented a unique set of circumstances for many healthcare services due to staff being redeployed to provide additional inpatient services, however my genuine concers lie with the consultants I have met. The inability to listen to valid and critically important patient input is so foreign to me from this service. As I'm sure you will know most Rheumatoid patients are stoic beings and most certainly go out of their way to understand the disease and how it interacts with their particular body, when you see a consultant zoning out as you describe symtoms or worse still have that consultant talk over you as you explain something to them is not acceptable practice, this and the apparent inability to make responses to GPs and other consultants working with Patients, myself very much included with extremely complex health issues does not tie in with the unit's once proudly proclaimed (and rightly so at one time) holistic approach to patient care.

Apologies for the poor formatting of this response but the text input does seem to differ from the finished product.

I thank you for your response

Response from Louise Noble, Service Manager, Planned Care, NHS Fife 3 years ago
We are preparing to make a change
Louise Noble
Service Manager, Planned Care,
NHS Fife
Submitted on 24/02/2022 at 16:33
Published on Care Opinion at 16:47


If you would like to speak to me directly I can be contacted via 01592 729275.

Kind regards

Louise

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