"Overall my experience has been very good indeed"

In May of 2023 I was diagnosed with Mantel Cell Lymphoma. From my initial appointment with the GP on a Friday morning his suspicions were raised and emergency bloods were take at the practice..  By the following day (Saturday) I was admitted for the day to the Hematology ward at ARI and over the coming days and weeks various tests and scans were carried out, culminating in my diagnosis.  

Six sessions of chemotherapy were to follow with 3 week breaks between each session.  As part of the monitoring regime I was to have bloods taken twice weekly, allowing the ARI staff to plan and develop my care further.

Initially bloods were to be taken at ARI but after the first appointment and staff realising that it just wasn't right that a patient was having to undergo a 4 hour car journey to do so having travelled from Forres, things quickly changed to the responsibility of the Community Hub at Forres Health Centre and Dr Grays, Elgin.

Arranging appointments through the call handlers was simple and straight forward and only once was there confusion and appointments had either not been logged properly or cancelled for another reason.  Overall however it was an efficient service.

I would normally have bloods taken at Forres on a Monday and Dr Grays on a Thursday.  Living in Forres, making my way to the Health Centre is simple and easily achieved on foot.  The staff who recovered the bloods  were those from Dr Grays.  Both members of staff were efficient and sympathetic to my situation but felt that both sets of weekly bloods should be taken a Forres in order to save on travel to Elgin each week.  However the weekly program that is run at Forres (only certain days) did not allow this.  I cannot emphasis how helpful these members of staff have been.  One has that typical mothering, empathic manner and the other has a very informative and practical approach, encompassed in the precision of a military operation.  Both valued members of staff I am sure.

The situation of collecting the blood samples over the weeks and months was however aggravated by the fact that staff were not and are still not trained to use a PICC Line, which I have fitted.  The design of the apparatus makes the task in hand so much more effective and straight forward.  More importantly "Infection Control" is paramount and twice weekly peripheral bloods being taken is not sympathetic towards this where the use of the PICC Line would help to avoid this.  There is also a Stem Cell transplant planned as part of my treatment and the constant use of arm veins does not allow the harvesting of cells a simple process, should veins be constantly in use for blood samples.  As I understand it, if veins are badly damaged and cannot be used to harvest, then a femoral line is fitted, which will see the patient in hospital taking up bed space when it could be avoided.

The Community Hub in Forres and the AEC ward in Dr Grays also came into their own when I was in need of a blood transfusion on 2 separate occasions and also a chest drain sample taken.  The AEC carried out the chest sample, saving on a trip to ARI and on the first occasion supplied the first blood transfusion.  The second transfusion was administered at Forres, which led me to some confusion as to why both could not have been carried out there.  To me the layman, it appears that doctors and consultants are not aware of what can be achieved at these local facilities and their automatic choice leans towards the patient travelling to ARI for most, if not all treatments when a little better communication between groups could see the Community Care teams serve patients better.

Overall however, my experience of the Community Hub and its related support groups has been very good indeed.  Staff have been tremendous, very helpful/sympathetic but communication may be able to be improved upon, aiding in the overall performance and efficiency of the Service.