"Improvements have definitely been made in..."

What I liked

I was impressed with the improvementIs in the care received at A & E at East Surrey Hospital. The staff morale has improved since 6 or 7 years ago when it was so bad that a Dr examining me in A&E gave me his name and told me to contact the media about the dreadful situation there when I got home. Sometime after that the chief executive was sacked. It was definitely 3rd world.

This time I had nothing but kindness and consideration from everyone. I did not have anything life threatening but I felt very ill and was in pain. They gave me pain and sickness relief intravenously soon after after I arrived which was by referral from a doctor at my out of hours centre. I understand there are about 40 more bays being made for A & E cases which will be good. When the doctor came to discharge me he said not to hesitate to come back if I needed to which was reassuring.

What could be improved

The time I waited to see the doctor could have been improved upon (about 2 hours) but at least I was in less pain and I was on a comfortable trolley and transferred to a bay as soon as one became available.

Anything else?

Making people more aware of out of hours services may help it may take some of the pressure off A & E departments. A lot of people don't know about it.

Planning authorities should be made to take much more care over allowing yet more development in already over-populated areas. We do not have enough hospitals to provide the services necessary. Better still, money should be found to provide more A & E departments in hospitals rather than closing them down.