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No hospital shop

Posted By yankeeks44

"No hospital shop"

About: Altnagelvin Area Hospital

(as a service user),

Admitted to Altnagelvin hospital and in a hurry forgot a few toiletries.

I asked staff at the help desk where the hospital shop was and to my amazement was told there is no shop. Why is this? 

Also, the grounds at exits and entrances re littered with chewing gum and cigarette butts which I feel is not a great image.

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Responses

Response from Joanne Quinn, Assistant Director of Facilities Management , Estates & Support Services, WHSCT 9 months ago
Joanne Quinn
Assistant Director of Facilities Management , Estates & Support Services,
WHSCT

Submitted on 19/07/2023 at 17:16
Published on Care Opinion at 17:16

Hello yankeeks44

Thank you for your feedback, we value and welcome all feedback regarding the Western Trust. I would like to start my response with a little background to shop facilities on the Altnagelvin site. When the Trust opened the new main Altnagelvin Hospital entrance at North Wing in 2020 the previous retail shop vendor did not uptake the offer of a new lease. The Trust therefore instead opened a café outlet which you are correct in highlighting does not sell basic toiletries. I apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Patient essentials are available at ward level on admission such as toothbrush, toothpaste, towel and comb. I am not sure from your feedback if this was offered to you and this will be raised with ward and department managers in terms of learning. In regards to litter and cigarette butts the Altnagelvin site, as with all of our Trust sites, is a smoke free, vape free site and there are signs to highlight and inform anyone visiting any of our hospital sites. Unfortunately, we are aware of breaches to this despite our best efforts in asking patients, visitors and staff not to smoke on site. We also advertise Trust smoking cessation support through many different platforms to help support people who smoke/vape and wants to stop. The Trust does not provide bins for cigarettes butts or litter at entrances as we believe that can be seen to encourage smoking. We also recognise that litter bins can be a fire risk unfortunately. There are bins located inside the hospital buildings. The grounds are cleaned/cleared every morning but unfortunately we are not resourced to monitor and clean this 24/7. I will take your feedback to managerial meetings for highlighting and discussion and if changes arise, I will notify you back via this care opinion platform again. I hope you will find this response useful and please feel free to contact me if you wish to discuss further Warmest regards

Joanne Quinn Assistant Director of Facilities Management

  • {{helpful}} {{helpful == 1 ? "person thinks" : "people think"}} this response is helpful

Update posted by yankeeks44 (a service user)

Thank you Joanne for your feedback. I do hope there will be some improvements done about the smoking. The beautiful new grounds around that North wing building is ruined with chewing gum and cigarette butt's. If it was on the streets of Derry they'd be fined for littering it shouldn't be any different especially should be more harsh fines on a health and care grounds.

I'll be sure to ask staff again if I ever do need to come back in. I was not offered. Maybe the wards need reminding of the simple things

This is a great platform for communicating I must say

Bye for now

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