According to Cambridge University Dictionary, the official definition for 'hospital' is "A place where people who are ill and sick are taken care of".
Until now I always believed this being the correct term, however through visiting my relatives in the Causeway Hospital in Coleraine, I am led to believe that this definition is far from the truth.
The list is endless of what is wrong with the ho
spital itself, including the lack of nurses and doctors with some patients dealing for roughly about 6 hours during the day with no pain relief or someone to tell their symptoms to. Another factor on this list is the disgusting state that some of the wards are in themselves. I witnessed one domestic cleaner, washing the entire room of one ward with one cloth; yet the ward is plastered with posters stating "Stop the risk of infection".
In the past couple of years, there has been an outcry at the NHS with the tremendous wait that some patients have to endure before even being seen.
Having to tell Accident and Emergency your severity of pain via a 1-10 scale, certainly shows that from the beginning you are in for a ride that you will want to get off.
I admit that a 1-10 scale is an easy way to find out what is actually wrong with patient, however, if you are sitting with a 4, and a several 6's come in simultaneously, the wait on uncomfortable chairs begins. The wait doesn't get any shorter when you go through triage and are through into actual Accident and Emergency and away from the waiting room. Waits from an hour to three are looming with no pain relief and no doctor examinations.
Personally, I know that when I am sick I do not like things going wrong. I am on a short temper to put it simply. Overheard was a conversation from one patient to two nurses, in which the patient asked "I am itchy" as he had been hospitalized due to a rash and the reply was "So, which one of us do you want to scratch you" and this statement was followed by a laugh from the nurses. This is inappropriate and I'm sure that if their superiors had heard this conversation, serious consequences would be guaranteed.
With a relative of mine, now being in hospital for over a week, the symptoms getting worse drastically and neither doctors or himself knowing what is wrong with him, these above factors are having him and his family on their wits end with worry about him.
Something has to be done to change this hospital for the better. How, might you ask. It has to come from the public.
Kathryn Millican
Email us your comments on this article - nichola.forgrave@jpress.co.uk or david.rankin@jpress.co.ukThe full article contains 481 words and appears in n/a newspaper.
