"Good care, but a noisy environment to recover in"

I would like to share with you my experience and observations of my recent admission to ward A6 after being rushed to the A & E Dept of Warrington Hospital in the early hours, a week or so ago.

The treatment and care I received from the nursing staff on arrival at A & E was outstanding. They managed to stabilise my condition enabling me to have some level of comfort, although I was still in extreme, excruciating pain. I was then transferred to ward A6 were, on arrival, the attention I received was exemplary - the nursing staff were superb. Once my condition had been stabilised with an untold amount of painkilling drugs I was moved to a more permanent position on one of the bays.

Now, I can understand that patients are in a various state of discomfort and distress, but it’s no excuse for treating the hard-working, dedicated nursing staff with what can only be described as borderline contempt! What on earth has happened to common courtesy and respect? Have people forgotten their manners... have the words ‘Please’ and ‘Thank You’ gone out of fashion and have become such hard words to say? They should be ashamed of themselves.

The vast majority of the staff are excellent, caring professionals who do an extremely difficult job very well whilst under tremendous pressure. However, what a patient needs most of all, when in the midst of extreme pain and suffering, is as much peace and quiet as possible. Unfortunately, some members of staff didn't seem to understand this and were a little over exuberant and loud in the way they approached their duties. I understand the need for this type of personality, but in this instance it was misplaced, especially when you have people in various states of distress, and/or even dying. There were times when the environment I was in was not conducive to helping people to a speedy recovery... in fact it made you feel worse!

A lack of sleep exacerbated my condition greatly making me more irritable and pained. It’s understandable and expected that there will be a certain level of noise and disruption, especially when there are people being admitted at all times of the day and night. But something should and can be done about the level of noise particularly the banging of doors, cupboard doors & drawers, metal bin lids etc. This was aggravating to say the least and didn't just happen during the daylight hours.

A simple and cheap solution to this problem, which would make a HUGE difference, would be to apply Soft Close Rubber Bumper Stops to all doors, drawers and bin lids etc. And, when any broken furniture needs replacing, it’s replaced with furniture that has soft close hinges and drawer runners. This way if a door or drawer accidently slips out of a nurses or patients hand, it won’t slam/bang shut.