"Excellent cardiac services"

Anything else?

I was admitted with an irregular heart beat on 2nd December. The care from the consultant who initially saw me was excellent and the pattern of excellence was maintained. The cardiac ward is Montuschi ward and that was where I was admitted. The ward was clean, the bed appeared to have rather rough sheets but they were actually more comfortable than the style of sheets that I have had before in this hospital. Staff worked in a purposeful way, there was evident team work with involvement of nurses, doctors and pharmacy staff. I needed a medication that was not immediately available in a small enough size, the nurses promised to sort this out and delivered on the promise that evening. It was obvious that the care that I received was the shared standard. Other older patients were treated with compassion. The man opposite me had an itchy back at around 2 am - a nurse rubbed a soothing cream in it. One patient was confused but care was taken to help her and time given to sort the issues. On the 3rd I had to be transferred to another unit for more specialist care because of the rarity of my problem. The Whittington end worked well and when the other hospital suddenly decided that they could not after all take me that day the Whittington team sorted it. At the other hospital, supposedly better, there was a failure of communication and again I observed that this experience was not unique to me. Even the ambulance that was ordered to take me back to the Whittington, never arrived and my wife drove me back. Cardiac wards are not restful places with all sorts of equipment bleeping away but nurses worked quietly in the night and washed their hands regularly. The experience was about as good as one might reasonably expect.