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The care i received was very good. I ...

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"The care i received was very good. I ..."

About: Macclesfield District General Hospital / Accident and emergency Macclesfield District General Hospital / Cardiology

(as the patient),

What I liked

The care i received was very good.

I was outside the area on a family break and unfortunately needed to come into hospital.

I was experiencing chest pains and A&E prioritised me which was welcome at the time. The nurse was attentive and helpful and when the doctors saw me they were equally decent and helpful.

Following transfer to the observation ward i was taken to a side room which again was very appreciated. Although the room floor was not clean it was cleaned not long after i arrived in the room.

Food during my stay was good and better than i have experienced previously at other hospitals.

I was transferred to the coronary care unit and the nurses there were also excellant and work very hard.

What could be improved

The length of time waiting for the results of the scan was far too long ( 7 hours , was told would be just over 1 hour ) and when the results came although good news the doctor that i saw was not qualified enough to give the full picture. It was only later when i saw the registrar that a clearer picture was given. Even that changed when i then saw the Cardiologist.

Possibly need more Cadiologists.

Nurses, work very hard and provide great support and care. There just is not enough of them unfortunately. There were quite a lot of times that the patients themselves had to look out for the other patients on your ward to make sure they did not hurt themselves by getting out of bed or trying to walk etc. At night times this meant hardly any sleep. As you had to walk down to the nurse desk so they were aware of who needed help. More nurses needed.

I think some of the support staff could be a little cleaner with washing hands etc. I did hear one nurse reminding the person who was delivering the tea/coffee to wash his hands as he had just dealt with a patient. This put me off my tea that morning.

Weekends. I do think this is probably a nationwide problem but basically nothing happens on weekends. Any scans that you need or any concerns you have just have to wait until Monday. This means you spend two days with nothing happening. Its frustrating and any concerns you have stay with you for that period. I dont know whether this will ever change on the NHS but it would be nice if more happened on weekends so that every day progress is made towards getting you home.

Anything else?

Macclesfield General is a very hard working hospital based on my experienced and i would like to thank them for the care they provided me with.

I would recommend this hospital.

The nurses at Macclesfield are absolutely fantastic and really do work hard. They just need more of them.

I saw the nurses dealing with difficult, demanding patients with real care and patience. If your loved one is in this hospital you can rest a little easy the nurses are doing their best to look after them.

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Responses

Response from Macclesfield District General Hospital 15 years ago
Macclesfield District General Hospital

Submitted on 09/01/2009 at 10:05
Published on nhs.uk on 10/01/2009 at 04:06

Thank you for writing to us with your very detailed story about your stay at Macclesfield Hospital. We welcome all feedback about what patients think of our services.

Firstly, we are very pleased to read that you were seen quickly in A&E and that the doctors and nurses were attentive and helpful. Thank you also for your kind words about our nurses. The nurses at Macclesfield work very hard and are committed to giving the very best care to patients. It is great to read that you feel that our nurses are fantastic.

We are sorry that you feel that we need more doctors and nurses. At Macclesfield we recognise how important medical and nursing staff are in providing good quality safe care for patients. We employ as many doctors and nurses as we can within our budget. We have recently appointed a third Consultant Cardiologist. In the National Adult Inpatient Survey 2007 our patients rated East Cheshire NHS Trust amongst the top 20% of hospitals for having enough nurses on duty to care for them. Overall we were amongst the top 20% of hospitals for patients having confidence and trust in our nurses.

Thank you also for your comments about the hospital food. We consistently score amongst the top 20% of hospitals for our food in patient surveys, and we aim to keep this up.

We are sorry to read that you were put off your drink because the person delivering it was reminded to wash their hands. However we are proud that the nurse on duty reminded this person. All our staff are encouraged not only to wash their hands, but to make sure that other staff, visitors and patients wash their hands, and to remind them if necessary. In addition, our Infection Prevention and Control team carry out monthly handwashing audits on the wards.

We are disappointed that you felt you waited too long for your scan results, and understand that this must have been worrying for you. We do try and feedback test results as quickly as we can. However, in most cases, treatment can begin before scan results come back.

We also apologies for delays caused during the weekend. The Trust is doing a big piece of work looking at how discharge can be improved – particularly at the weekend. One of these projects is that consultants are leaving a list of criteria for each patient on Friday evening – if the patient matches the criteria then specialist nurses and registrars are able to discharge the patient without waiting until Monday. This is being rolled out ward by ward. The Cardiology ward has only just started this month, and may still be getting used to the new system.

I would like to reassure you that every hospital ward has a consultant and medical team on call over the weekend. If there is any downturn in a patient’s condition, the on call team will come on to the ward and carry out any necessary tests or treatments.

Above all, we are very pleased that you feel you would recommend out hospital, and that you would rest easy knowing a loved one was in the care of our nurses.

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