"Hospital Comment"

What I liked

Some of the staff were friendly

What could be improved

This is the 2nd complaint I have made due to unfortuantely visiting the hospital 3 times in a week.

The original visit my son had croup and as stated in my previous feedback the ward was simply filthy, silverfish crawling round in the bathroom and baby poo stuck to the changing mat. The second visit was only 3 days later due to my son having severe diarrhoea and vomiting, it turns out that my son had contracted the rotor virus, now seeing as how he was house bound for the 3 days after his last visit I can only summise that he contracted this nasty virus whilst in hospital the first time, which is hardly surprising given the simply unbelievable filthy conditions on the ward.

The third time was only a couple of days later after that as we were concerned that my son was becoming dehydrated, he was weighed the 1st time he visited hospital at 10.1 kilos which was apparently perfect, but when he was weighed on his last visit he was only 9.2 kilos, the nurse actually stated that it was impossible that my son had lost this much weight and summised that he must have been weighed incorrectly (bearing in mind that he hadn't been able to keep solids down for four days), so the nurse decided to leave the 10.1 kilo weight on his records rather than his new weight of 9.2 kilos stating that "if he had lost that much weight you would be able to see his ribs", wow she must be good if she can tell the weight of a baby just by their ribs!! Correct me if I'm wrong but this strikes me as extremely negligent and very dangerous as incorrect information was being recorded. It was apparent to my wife and I that he was severely under weight but even after trying two different sets of scales the nurse refused to except that he had lost that much weight and continued to stick to her theory of he must of been weight incorrectly the first time (so why on earth did she not alter it if she was so adamant that the weight was incorrect! Mind boggling!!

Anything else?

I am simply at a loss as to how this hospital remains open and to call itself a hospital, surely with this level of care people are suffering needlessly not to mention babies, you are supposed to be able to trust hospitals but I have absolutely no faith in Darlington Hospital, you go to hospital to get better but my son was actually made worse by going to hospital, I mean correct me if I'm wrong but that is just ridiculous!! How can this be an acceptable level of care, are senior managers aware that this level of care seems to be the norm, I have come to accept the fact that hospitals are now just a business and patient care is no longer the priority but balancing the books, I have lost all faith in the NHS and as such have decided to go private. I sincerely believe that due to this hospital my family suffered under it's care and I really do fear that a poor unfortuante family are going to pay the ultimate price if something doesn't changePatient carePrivacyBabiesComplaintsVisiting timesCroupCleanlinessBathroomCommunication