"From excellent to bad care."

Firstly, I am indebted to the doctors who carried out the diagnosis and the recommended treatment for me.

Also to the excellent care I received from most of the nurses.

The paramedics were exceptionally good (2 young males).

I was not prepared for the shock which awaited me as we arrived at the A & E.

I found it to be chaotic, inhumane, degrading, disgraceful.

Trolley after trolley in a narrow corridor.

Medical staff rushing around.

Time taken to assess me and admitted to a ward 10 hours.

Discharge day took 12 hours before we were signed off, received our medication and was allowed to leave.

It grieves me to state the following comments :

I was forced to ask a member of my family to bring in paracetamol tablets for my pain.

Despite two young nurses having faces of angels left me in pain for hours.

These two nurses were working on different wards but both used the exact same actions also the same words when they eventually brought me pain relief.

(They came to me jiggling the tablets in a small container saying “is this what you are looking for”).

My response was to aggressively snatch them from one of these nurses. Neither compassion nor re-assurance was shown by them.

On one of the occasions the last tablet was given at 3.30pm, I didn’t receive the next dose until 9.30pm that night. Had I been a demanding patient I could have forgiven this treatment.

I have to say the drug rounds were on time and very thoroughly checked and distributed. These incidents were “out of hours” initially the tablets were not lasting for the 4 hours.

On another occasion the speed at which I was taken by wheelchair to another ward quite a distance away was unbelievably unsafe, they were almost running.

The two nurses taking me were chatting away side by side; oblivious to the anxiety I was feeling.

I experienced as well as witnessed firsthand, very bad nursing care, patients being insulted, rushed, placed in precarious situations; one lady was left with her legs wide open exposing herself , albeit for a short time.

The screen had not been fully closed.

Very sadly, the list goes on.

Good Nurses, rushing around with no time to communicate with patients. It seemed like respect, dignity, compassion, well-being for both medical staff and patients is no longer important in your quest to meet targets.

I have part read the directors 2016/2017 annual report and although I can only imagine the difficulty in managing an organization of this size, it is, in my opinion, a fanciful report.

It is blatantly obvious our doctors and their medical teams are understaffed, overworked, undervalued and I suspect underpaid, working in intolerable conditions.

A complete overhaul of the system is required, sooner rather than later.