"Clean with excellent doctors, but other staff poor"

What I liked

Building and ward was clean, ward was large and well equipped. Doctors were excellent in terms of ability and knowledge, bedside manner could be improved a little although could have been a lot worse.

What could be improved

Nursing staff were in general feckless - not at all bothered about patients or their families. All they cared about was ticking boxes, filling forms and chatting to each other. Level of skill relating to venepuncture and cannulation was awful.

Communication between doctors and nurses and between clinical staff and pharmacy was appalling to non-existent. Nurses didn't communicate well with each other, especially across shifts. They did not inform patients or family about what was happening at all unless prompted, often numerous times. Many seemed surley and disinterested. Anything out of the ordinary that was not well understood was just ignored in the hope it would go away. Mistakes were made with note taking by doctors. Admin staff barely knew who the patient was or why they were there.

Dehydration was not taken seriously. Adequate pain relief was not provided the day after surgery onwards. Appropriate pain management medication for after discharge was not provided or even offered. Patient was not made comfortable after an operation (ie bed not made properly around them etc). Additional dressings, or information about dressings required, were not provided. Nurses didn't know where the patient was half the time or whether they were ok. Messages passed by doctors to recovery regarding informing family were not acted upon. Nobody could tell the family whether the operation had been successful - all they knew was that the patient was back on the ward. Dietary requirements were not respected (custard for a dairy free patient who had requested no custard!). Patient discharged in my opinion at least a day early - being unable to do anything for themselves because of unmanged pain is not a condition in which someone should be discharged. Speaking to patients using medical terminology is not helpful and just frightens patients.

Anything else?

Not taking time to ensure patients have understood everything is not good and teling them they will have their pain managed and then not botheirng is not acceptable.

In general doctors very good, other staff I felt were generally hopeless. Problems- doctors not well trained in patient facing techniques, most nurses and other staff not wanting to care for or respond to patients and not bothered about making the patients feel comfortable, just interested in ticking the neccessary boxes.

Clenliness was excellent - but that and the skills of the doctors (which are both basics anyway) were the only good points. In general, it is a shambles and managers need to deal with this urgently.

I'm the cararer of the patient referred to above and I would be terrified if I ever had to be an inpatient at Hope/Salford Royal. I would do my very best to avoid it.