"My short stay in A+E and EAU"

A few weeks ago now I had to be taken to A+E as I was taken ill whilst on a trip to Surrey some 70 miles from home, the waiting to be seen time was fairly minimal and the A+E staff and treatment could not be faulted, in the evening I was admitted to the emergency admisions unit for the night and some of the next day where I was first seen by a dual nationality care worker (using a temporary pin no) they tried to fill in a form with my details starting with my name, I have a very ordinary English name and I speak very clearly but despite this, including slowly spelling my name there was no way they could understand and so I suggested they passed the form to my visitor friend who the completed the form for them. As I had been given Digoxin that evening I had to have an ECG at 4 o,clock next morning, at the allotted time the above mentioned member of staff arrived with an ECG machine and spent some time fumbling around with the cables without managing to connect any of them to the contacts already stuck on me from a previous test, they quite clearly had no idea at all how to work the machine and left the room, they returned later with another care assistant and between them they managed after some five or six attemps to get some sort of a reading on the graph sheet. In due course another member of staff came in and started to read out to me the breakfast menu, ticking off my various choices, half way through they said in a strong accent something that I understood to be "Apple strudel", which after some questioning and head scatching on my part I found they actually said "Haveyoudoneapoostoolsample?". I`ve had many a laugh from the latter since but these things could lead to quite serious mistakes, And by the way I can usually understand regional and foreign accents where most of my friends cant!. I must stress I have absolutely nothing against workers from overseas and they are a much valued asset to this country but it is vital the good proper comunication can take place at all times between staff and patients.