"A&E for my 101-year-old aunt"

Yesterday my 101-year-old aunt was taken to Barnet General A&E after having sustained a fall in her care home. She was driven in an ambulance, but I drove separately and after a nightmare 15 minutes circling the car park in a fruitless search for a space, I dumped the car on a side street and eventually met up with my aunt at the hospital at 2.45pm, at which time she was in the ambulance handover area. The paramedic with her was caring and concerned. Soon a doctor approached and said Auntie Jean would be bypassing A&E since it was noisy and busy, and would be taken instead to an Urgent Care Clinic. We were seen very quickly and the doctors and nurses concerned were caring, considerate and treated my aunt with dignity. They fully understood that she hated hospitals and needed to be processed as soon as possible. In fact by 4.15pm she had been seen, her head wounds had been glued and she had been given a comfortable chair, a cup of tea and a sandwich before being transported back to her home. All in all I was very impressed by the speed, efficiency and level of care shown at the hospital.