"Vaccination clinic care"

I attended the COVID vaccination clinic recently at the town hall with my extraordinarily needle-phobic teenage daughter. We queued with everyone else and when we reached the front door, the security guard started chatting to my daughter about school etc. I feel it must have become extremely apparent, very quickly that she was terrified. He respectfully took her hands, asked her to breathe and calmly offered to take her straight through. He then expertly distracted her whilst the vax was done, then left us to continue his job.

I cannot begin to express what a difference this simple act made to my daughter. I am a nurse working in tertiary health care at the moment, I fully appreciate the demands and stress people are under. I was astounded at the kindness and professionalism shown to my daughter from both the security staff member (apologies that I did not get his name) and the kind, very efficient vaccination nurse who administered her shot.

I will stress that we were absolutely prepared to wait in the remaining queue, but to have been offered the option at that time and to not have her become even more distressed (which often results in hyperventilation, tears +++ etc) was just so amazing.

Thank you so much for this simple act of professionalism and kindness, it makes my job of getting her back for her second dose that little bit easier!