"My daughter fell off her horse ..."

What I liked

My daughter fell off her horse on Easter Saturday (3rd April), at the time I thought she had bruised her arm, but was advised by the stables that I should get it checked out. The location of the stables is in between two hospitals, both equal distances apart, so I chose Darent Valley (rather than Queen Elizabeth, Woolwich). I am so pleased that I made that decision.

Upon arriving at A&E, we were advised by the A&E receptionists to go along to the Urgent Care unit within the hospital as "it would be quicker to be seen". On the walk down to the Unit, we were stopped by a Sister who asked us what had happened, and said that she wanted to take a look at my daughter's arm. She took us into the Paediatric's part of A&E and my daugther was examined. Indeed, she had severely broken her left arm, just above her elbow. The Sister, although very busy and had hardly any staff on her shift to help, was fantastic. She stayed with my daughter whislt I booked her in officically, spent time with us to explain to us what was going to happen and introduced us to the surgeon who was going to operate on my daughter's arm, even allowing the only staff member on duty on that day to accompany us to the theatre. One particular Sister is a god send to the hospital.

My daughter's consultant is One of a kind. Words can not describe them properly, but through out the surgery and the follow up appointments they were very kind and considerate, and even spoke to us, in particular my daughter, in normal english, rather than consultant speak!!! They did not jazz things up or make them sound better than they were, they are very down to earth and made us fully aware of what to expect when my daughter's pins came out.

Even though my daughter's accident was an experience not wish to be repeated, I can not fault any of the A&E Staff or the Consultant and his staff through out our time at the hospital. Thank You All.