Care Opinion

Dismissive service

Posted By Tootsiepops

"Dismissive service"

About: University Hospital Hairmyres / Medical Assessment Unit

(as a relative),

My husband suffers from stage 4 nscl cancer which is incurable and inoperable. He was on immunotherapy for last 4 months.

Last week  he was advised by cancer specialist nurse to go to A & E at Hairmyres, where she had arranged for him to have a chest x ray, as his extreme symptoms of gasping like a fish out of water could be a pleural effusion. 

The X ray was inconclusive and a CT scan was arranged after which he was sent to ward 2 to await his results. The staff there were really nice apart from the Doctor  who proceeded to inform my husband that if he was looking for answers to his cancer, then he was in the wrong place. This doctor dismissed my husband as if he were an old geriatric nuisance and spoke down to him as if he was a idiot.

My husband was too ill to stand up for himself and to make matters even worse, the doctor had written in my husbands medical notes that his symptoms were down to cancer progression. 

Then he was dismissed home, making my husband feel that he was being sent home to die. 

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Responses

Response from Marjorie McGinty, Head of Improvement, Quality Directorate, NHS Lanarkshire 3 years ago
Marjorie McGinty
Head of Improvement, Quality Directorate,
NHS Lanarkshire

Submitted on 18/12/2021 at 15:40
Published on Care Opinion at 15:40

picture of Marjorie McGinty

Dear Tootsiepops

Thank you for taking the time to tell us about you and your husbands recent experience of using A&E and then ward 2 at University Hospital Hairmyres.

I am very sorry that your husband was spoken to like this and for the upset it caused to him and to you.

I understand that with your husband being ill it is a difficult time but if you can I would appreciate you contacting the Patient Affairs team at University Hospital Hairmyres so that we can get more details to allow us to investigate this further. You can contact the Patient Affairs team by tel on 01355 585 325 or by
Email: PatientAffairs.Hairmyres@lanarkshire.scot.nhs.uk

once again I apologies to you and your husband for the way he was spoken to and the upset caused. I hope we can learn from this to avoid it happening again.

thank you

  • {{helpful}} {{helpful == 1 ? "person thinks" : "people think"}} this response is helpful

Update posted by Tootsiepops (a relative)

Thank you for your response. My husband was readmitted to same hospital, a few days later, by his medical team and they have made a formal complaint about the doctor involved.

Husband in ward 12 and the staff can't do enough for him. For that I am grateful.

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