"The specialist nurse who informed ..."

What I liked

The specialist nurse who informed my husband and me that he had an operable cancer of the pancreas and the staff who carried out the scans were excellent.

What could be improved

Communication between departments and some of the nursing staff. My husband was referred urgently by his GP and scans etc were arranged very quickly - the nursing staff assumed we knew which doctor he was under but no one had told us. One triage nurse in A&E (where we were sent to wait for a bed, which took 4 hours) was very insensitive and greeted my husband with the words 'Why are you here?' She did not even read his notes beforehand although they were on the desk; we were still in shock at the news of his cancer. He did not deserve this treatment.

Anything else?

In A&E there appeared to be more staff than patients yet, with the exception of one very pleasant nurse, no one explained what was happening. After 4 hours my husband was taken to A&EObs, which had the appearance of the inside of a refrigerator and I absolutely hated leaving him there. There was dust and a sweetwrapper under the bed and fingermarks on the metal framework of the bed. He'd had nothing to eat or drink for several hours and all the drinks machines were out of order.