'Something has to change' at 'disgusting' Grimsby hospital

“s_pike, I think you have been lucky. Its years since I was in hospital, back then the food was pretty awful, but the care was excellent and, back in the days when the cleaning staff were actually employees of the hospital, the place was spotlessly clean. Not anymore!

When a friend was in hospital recently the first ward she was placed in had dried blood on the floor, the toilets were too disgusting to go into detail on here and the meal that I saw her attempting to eat consisted of a thin slice of ham that covered the centre of the sandwich and in any case had more fat than ham on it. Following her operation she was placed in a side room, the toilet in this room was even more disgusting and had not been cleaned between occupants. Even worse the room had not been cleaned either, as evidenced by the fact that a tube of ointment was lying on the floor by the bed. A tube of ointment that we later learnt is used for treating people with MRSA!!!

On top of that, out of the 5 people I know that have had reason to go into hospital in the last few years, only one of the has not contracted some type of 'bug' whilst they were there. The friend mentioned above contracted a chest infection, another friend had to readmitted 3 times after being sent out with water infections contracted whilst in hospital and my daughter and another friend both came home with sickness bugs. On top of this the care received was sketchy, my friend who was in the private room often waited ages for assistance and had to press the nurse call button several times before it came. Another friend ended up helping the gentleman in the next bed to eat and drink as the nursing staff just left his meals on a tray at the end of his bed and he could not feed himself.”

“The place is a disgrace - I have had family members in there recently and in the past who have had first hand experience of the incompetencies of the organisation. Lost personal items following a transfer to a different ward / bay, which was flatly denied, but then turned up out the blue after chasing it up for a few days. One elderly family member was sent home with somebody elses tablets. Had it not been for another family members vigilance then these could have been taken by mistake and who knows what damage could have been done. Recently a relative was in a ward with another patient who had been given his prescribed medication prior to being discharged. It was only because the hospital transport was running late (as usual)that this individual checked his medication only to find a box that contained nothing at all!!! One of my relatives was prescribed extra tablets by one doctor, only to be told that she didn't need to take them by another, so she left them. When the first doctor was doing his next rounds it turns out that she should have taken them after all. These are just a few first hand experiences, when you talk to others it is frightening what you hear and the frequency of similar events. Why is no-one held accountable for this negligence? To top it off, just this week I received a phone call from the hospital at 10am (disturbing my sleep as I'm on nights) asking if I could come in for an appointment early, only to find they were after my father. The ironic thing was that he was already at the hospital having been collected by the HOSPITAL'S OWN ARRANGED TRANSPORT at 9:10am. The place is a shambles.

This isn't a normal office job, peoples lives are in the hands of this hospital. It's no wonder it has a high death rate.”

“I don't believe a single word of these anonymous stories and cannot understand how they could have ever got into print and particularly with a heading like that. It's the article that's 'disgusting' and it certainly doesn't match my favourable experiences of The DPoW Hospital.”

“My bad experience isn't as bad as others, but bad enough for me to take my daughter out of the care of the paediatric dept. My daughter has a condition which causes her body to destroy her thyroid(auto immune thyroiditis). She needs regular blood tests to determine her medication. But since being refered she has had every single appointment cancelled and rearranged. This resulted in her going without a bloodtest for nearly a year, and she gained alot of weight. They were supposed to refer her to a dietitian-nothing came of it. I eventually complained, and got a cancellation appointment. when we attended the appointment we were told that there had been a number of appointments that had been rearranged, but the paperwork hadn't gone out in time. So it was yet another wait of 3 months. Then when that appointment was also cancelled, I got them to take my daughter off their list and she is now being refered elsewhere, which will involve travelling, so more cost and more time off school.

Everytime she has had 3 different doctors in 3 years, and only 3 appointments. They have all been very nice doctors and I have no complaint about them. The nurse and receptionist are also very nice and helpful. But to have evry blooming appointment cancelled and rearranged, and then again, and then to turn up and be told it had been cancelled again, is rubbish! My daughter is meant to see her paediatrician every 6 months, and have blood tests then too. If it wasn't for me taking her to the doctors for a blood test, she wouldn't have got one.”

“Until the 'targets' and 'paperwork' involved with all hospitals/police forces/education establishments etc. are reduced and their core purposes reinstated - nothing will change.

The reason most people have been taken away from what they thought would be their line of work is that they are too busy ticking boxes to i) justify their jobs and meet hierarchy targets and ii) make sure, that if there is any come-back, someone's head won't be on the block.

Hardly any surprise that so many things in this world are collapsing - what would matron have said?!!”