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"Hospital care"

About: Rockingham General Hospital / Emergency Department Rockingham General Hospital / Medical Assessment Unit (MAU)

(as the patient),

On day 2 in hospital, the doctors came to see me in the morning with the all clear from my CT and ultrasound that I didn't need surgery, it was most likely a kidney infection. At this point I assumed I'd be sent home that day, they took another urine sample and bloods and I waited. I've had a kidney infection before so knew they'd need to culture to see what antibiotics would work etc. A couple of hours passed, I called for a nurse 4 times and each time got a student nurse, asking if they had any results from my urine yet and saying I had a headache and nausea. Each time I got a response of, I'm not sure, let me go check and I'll be right back, but the nurse never returned.

About 2.5 hours later the senior nurse came to tell me the urine sample had been sent to the lab with no label so they needed another one, and I was staying overnight. I was very upset by this news as it took them this long to realise my urine was lost, and it hadn't been communicated that I'd be staying overnight again to me at all until this point. The senior nurse was very lovely and took good care of me through the night but just that afternoon's lack of care and attention to detail from the student nurses was disappointing. Several occasions went by through the night and morning that someone would come to see me and couldn't find my chart, the next morning the doctors team came to see me for discharge and said they'd been all over the hospital to find me, and again couldn't find my chart. I felt severe lack in communication seemed to be the downfall of my experience.

Overall the staff I dealt with were friendly and attentive when I needed it, however there was one particular nurse in the ED when I first came to hospital in the evening who I felt was extremely rude, cold and didn't seem to care at all. They were dismissive, just said they don't know and walked off if I asked a question. When my CT scan was clear they came in and smugly said to me as I recalled, "well I guess there's nothing wrong with you then" and walked off, made me feel like they thought I was faking the excruciating pain that had me in tears. I asked another staff member if that particular nurse was usually like that and they said yes, they're grumpy all the time. If they're a regular ED nurse they definitely need a chat in patient care because they were really awful towards me.

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Responses

Response from Kath Smith, Executive Director, Rockingham Peel Group, South Metropolitan Health Service 2 years ago
Kath Smith
Executive Director, Rockingham Peel Group,
South Metropolitan Health Service
Submitted on 12/04/2022 at 1:40 PM
Published on Care Opinion at 2:11 PM


picture of Kath Smith

Dear Rockopatient2022,

Thank you for your feedback regarding your recent experience at the Rockingham General Hospital Emergency Department (ED) and Medical assessment unit (MAU), I am pleased to hear that you felt most staff were friendly and attentive. I am very sorry that your urine sample was not labelled correctly and had to be recollected. The MAU is committed to providing patient centred care and this includes clear communication with patients, as a result of your feedback we will liaise with the student’s clinical facilitators and ward supervisors to provide a reminder regarding the importance of communication and providing feedback to patient enquiries. The MAU nurse unit manager (NUM) will also remind staff to ensure all medical records are returned to the appropriate location after use.

I am disappointed to hear that you felt the ED nurse was rude, cold, uncaring and dismissive. I can reassure you that this is not the standard that we expect from our staff. RGH ED is committed to providing compassionate quality care. If you would like to provide further information to allow us to follow up with this staff member directly, I would encourage you to contact our consumer liaison officers on 9599 4323.

We appreciate your feedback and hope that you are recovering well.

Kath Smith

Executive Director

Rockingham Peel Group

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