"Caring Junior Doctor"

We took my mother in law in to the hospital last night after her speech became garbled and she felt unwell.

The initial triage was swift and thorough before transferring her to the AMU.

She was reviewed by a Dr who took a careful history and listened carefully to the sequence of events.

My mother in law by this time was significantly better and had regained normal speech.

The Dr did the physical tests to determine if a TIA had taken place. He was both thorough and caring in his approach as at times my mother in law wasn’t really sure of what he was asking her to do. He then decided to ask for a CT Scan and subsequently told us he and the person he had asked advice from could see a small dark area on the brain.

At this time, we could have been sent home with a TIA Clinic referral but the Dr took the time to ask for advice from specialists in another hospital as by now it was very late in the evening and there were no specialists available on site.

The results came back that the dark area didn’t look like a bleed but an area of calcification.

This was explained to us using none medical jargon and care was taken that she understood that while not immediately urgent or life threatening the results would be sent to a TIA Clinic for further investigation. A high dose of Aspirin was given and 14 days of a smaller dose provided for us to take home.

All in all, the staff in the department which was extremely busy provided a caring service in a timely manner.