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Care Opinion

Lack of staff

Posted By foxtrotfb38

"Lack of staff"

About: PathWest Albany Collection Centre

(as the patient),

In my opinion, the Pathwest collection centre at The Albany Health Campus was hopelessly understaffed at my latest visit.

The staff were, as usual, professional and kind; however, I believe they were inundated with clients requiring their services. There were people queueing well beyond the small waiting area, trying hard to maintain a safe distance from each other. I felt staff were run off their feet while clients were left standing for long periods of time due to a lack of seating.

In my opinion, this was difficult for the elderly, infirm and parents trying to manage small children. I believe those of us waiting understood that phlebotomy cannot be rushed, but I believe this problem could be alleviated by having enough staff on site to ensure all of the phlebotomy rooms can function at the same time, while also allowing for patients on the wards to have their tests taken as well. I fear that errors may be made if staff feel too overwhelmed by the number of clients. 

Thank you for hearing my story.

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Responses

Response from Martin Taylor, Acting Operations Manager, Regional Services, PathWest laboratory Medicine 3 years ago
Martin Taylor
Acting Operations Manager, Regional Services,
PathWest laboratory Medicine

Submitted on 19/10/2020 at 2:53 PM
Published on Care Opinion at 4:27 PM

Hi foxtrotb380,

Thank you so much for taking the time to let me know about the Albany PathWest collection centre. I am sorry that you had to wait a long time in a crowded waiting room. I have made some enquiries and I can tell you that the situation there was due to 2 phlebotomists being unexpectedly off work this morning. This has caused a delay in patients being seen. This was exacerbated by the large number of patients presenting this morning.

As for the lack of seating in the waiting room and insufficient phlebotomy rooms, this has been identified previously and steps are in place to identify an additional area in the hospital to use. We are awaiting a decision from the Albany Hospital. This problem has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 requirements to space chairs apart.

We always want to see our patients as quickly as possible and provide adequate facilities but unexpected absences cannot always be remedied straight away.

Thanks once again for your helpful comments.

Martin Taylor

A/Operations Manager

Regional Services Network

PathWest.

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