"Colon Cancer Operation"

My name is David Bowers and I was,for eight years,Deputy Leader of Macclesfield Borough Council in the 1980's and three times Chairman of Poynton Parish Council in the 1970's. I spent ten days in the Macclesfield District General Hospital in mid septermber having a surgical operation for colon cancer. I read so much in the national press, particularly the tabloids, that I felt I should let your readers know how different my experience was,and still is, from the things I read in the papers. For a start the procedure went very smoothly from day one, when I arrived at 7.30, was processed,showered and ready for theatre before 9.30 a.m. and back in Ward one by 3.30 p.m. Two days of recovery were followed by a relapse and then a gradual build up to a further relapse some three days later. Normality returned with all drips,drains pipes and tubes removed on the tenth day. The gist of this letter/article is to highlight the extreme dedication of the nursing staff and all the care and helpfulness of the ancillary staff. I was in Bay four, a six-bedded part of a much larger ward, which was always filled very quickly if a cured patient left. In my Ward there was a gentleman with dementia and another with Alzheimer's, both of whom often required one to one nursing, but in spite of that, when one pressed a buzzer for assistance, there was only one occasion when the wait for attention was over one minute and that was on a day when regular staff were short and agency staff had to be brought in. How many private hospitals can even equal that, I wonder!!! Nothing was too much trouble and the compassion with which they dealt with everything,even the most difficult patients, had to be seen to be appreciated. No one needs to fear admission to Macclesfield Hospital. But the praise does not stop there, because the join between the hospital and the District Nursing Service was seamless. I was seen on the day after discharge by a District Nurse who,after treating me,gave me two telephone numbers, one for 9-5p.m. local to Poynton and the other from 6pm. to 8.0a.m.for the Macclesfield area back up service. The same evening a problem arose just before six so I rang the appropriate number and a District Nurse based in Macclesfield had seen me before 8.0.p.m.I'm not sure that sort of service can be bettered.