"A ‘Heartfelt’ Thank You to the NHS"

In these days of some people knocking the NHS I would like to express my ‘heartfelt’ thanks for the wonderful treatment I received recently. On Monday (2/6) lunch time I suffered a couple of fainting attacks at home and my wife rang 999. The ambulance arrived promptly within 5-10 minutes and decided I needed to be taken to A&E. At Chorley hospital I was thoroughly checked out and advised I needed to stay overnight and put on a heart monitor. I was therefore moved to Medical Assessment ward and the monitor detected a heart pause. The consultant therefore said I would need to be fitted with a pacemaker and he would do this on Thursday (5/6) in Royal Preston. I was monitored in Coronary Care ward until I was transferred by ambulance to Royal Preston Cath Lab early Thursday morning for the operation to fit the pacemaker. I was back in Chorley Coronary Care by early evening and discharged on Friday (6/6) morning. All the time I was in hospital I was treated excellently with care, dignity, friendliness, efficiency, humour and professionalism by each and everyone I came into contact with: doctors, nurses, ambulance personnel, porters, X-ray staff, cleaners et al. I could not have wished for better care and attention from every single member of staff. I even enjoyed the food! In these days when we all, myself included, find it easy to ‘moan and whinge’ I felt I should try and redress the balance and give credit where it is due. This was my first stay in hospital for 40 years, since I had my appendix removed as a twenty something, and my experience is that we still have a NHS to be proud of. Yes, I know that perhaps it is not always as rosy as just described, but let’s just appreciate what we have in this country/area.