"Brilliant professional, timely, compassionate care"

We were staying in the New Forest, in a holiday cottage for the weekend. My husband has a history of suddenly going into atrial fibrillation, and woke up with an attack at 5. 30 on Sunday November 9th. Sometimes this condition sorts itself out within an hour or so but by 10 am I decided we would need to get him seen. (He wasn’t convinced! ).

Unusually there was no indication of the nearest A&E in the cottage (now remedied) but on my phone I found Lymington New Forest Hospital which has a Minor injuries Unit. I wasn’t sure if they could help or not but they were very near. On arrival we said that we knew they may not be able to help, but he was immediately triaged, taken through and had an ECG which confirmed fast AF, then to our surprise they said that they had a doctor in their Medical Assessment Unit and he was sat in a wheelchair and pushed down the corridor and into a bed, and onto a monitor. He was rapidly and comprehensively assessed, by the nurses and then seen by the doctor, and after monitoring him for some hours the decision was taken to try and jolt his heart back into normal rhythm using medication as other methods hadn’t worked, and the view was that he was too young to use more drastic measures.

Eventually his heart did “flip” back into normal rhythm, coincidentally just as the Consultant arrived on the ward (at 6. 30 pm on a Sunday evening! ) and we were able to take him back to the cottage.

The staff were incredibly professional but kind, and very visible and astute. He even liked the food!