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Absolutely Appalling

Story from nhs.uk

"Absolutely Appalling"

About: St Albans City Hospital

What I liked

not a lot

What could be improved

My wife went to the minor injuries unit and was sent in to tears by the officious staff.

On arrival she was admonished for not having an appointment and given a leaflet on "How to do it right next time"

This is despite having checked on the NHS website before:

"You don’t need an appointment to use a minor injuries unit."

http://www.hertfordshire.nhs.uk/your-local-services/the-nhs-belongs-to-us-all-lets-use-it-right/minor-injuries.html

Patients making the effort to get to the unit are clearly going to be unwell, to be treated in such an uncaring manner is particularly heartless.

Please either correct the websites or give staff the right information. Don't blame the patient if you can't sort yourselves out!

It would also be nice to not have to detail the medical issue in full hearing of the waiting room.

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Responses

Response from St Albans City Hospital 11 years ago
St Albans City Hospital

Submitted on 13/08/2012 at 11:59
Published on nhs.uk on 05/09/2012 at 20:59

Thank you for providing feedback of your wife’s distressing experience of the Minor Injuries Unit at St Albans.

Clearly, your experience has fallen short of the high standard you should expect with us, particularly with regards to good communication.

Issues of this nature are taken very seriously. Please be assured that patients do not need to make appointments to attend the Unit; it is designed as a walk-in centre, open from 09.00 - 20.00, 7 days a week, barring exceptional circumstances which should be displayed through clear on-site signage.

We know that our senior clinical colleagues will want to investigate this thoroughly on your behalf, so we can look into what went wrong for you and why – if only to prevent something like this happening again.

Therefore if you are willing to do so, please contact us directly through the Trust’s Quality Assurance department at wherts-tr.complaintsteam@nhs.net . We will aim to thoroughly investigate these issues promptly, and provide you with a detailed response.

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