Letter: Ward vital 'in hour of need'

4:13pm Monday 14th January 2008

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OVER the last few years, I have done what I can to help the save our hospital campaign. With good reason. I reckon I have, over the last 40 years, been in and out of hospital in excess of 50 times, with one thing or another, in Lancaster, Barrow and Kendal, as well as Ulverston and Beaumont, before they closed it down.

I cannot in any way complain about the treatment I received in any of them. But it has always seemed to me the staff in the smaller, Kendal hospital were more friendly, and had more time to see to your needs, thus promoting a happier atmosphere and speedier recovery. Big is not always better.

The week before Christmas I spent yet a few more days in Kendal hospital, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the staff, in particular those on ward 11, for the TLC I received while in their care. Even with the threat of closure looming over them, their dedication has not diminished in any way.

Lying in my hospital bed, I was amazed and dismayed to learn that ward 11 was yet again threatened with closure, so I would like to pose a question to those who made the executive decision.

What will happen to the future patients who in their hour of need will not have ward 11 at their disposal?

I estimated while I was in there, between 35 and 45 patients were either in, or passed through, that one ward, all in some form of distress which necessitated them being there in the first place. Not to mention the rest of the hospital patients.

I was also given to understand that both Lancaster and Barrow were running at full capacity. So would they have been left at home to suffer in silence?

Perhaps in future they could all be stacked in redundant rural sub post offices in some form of stasis, out of sight, out of mind, until a bed becomes available.

My wife, like me an old age pensioner, and my friends were easily able to visit me. I think that I would have been rather worried if they had to have made a 40 or 80 mile round trip on a cold December night with poor visibility and sub zero temperatures, not to mention the parking nightmare when they arrived at either Lancaster or Barrow.

I have been given three outpatient appointments in the beginning of January, all on, or about nine o'clock in the morning at Kendal hospital. It doesn't take much imagination to think what time of day I would have to set off, if I had to travel through Lancaster to make the appointed time. That's assuming, of course, that I could have found one of those elusive parking spaces when I arrived there.

Ken CurwenEndmoor