This morning I finally had my long awaited meeting with senior staff at the hospital who made such a botch up of Mum’s long stay earlier this year.
Chris (with me for moral support)and I were faced with three consultants (the nice one chaired the meeting), plus the ward sister, one of the staff nurses, a rep from PALS (Patient Liaison Service)and a rep from ICAS (can’t remember what it stands for, but an independant body), and the whole thing lasted just over an hour and a half – a full on hour and a half at that! It was more than a little daunting to start off with, but did end up going much better than I expected.
In a nutshell, they held up their hands to virtually all the issues, and acknowledged that mistakes had been made. I only had to argue one point, and that too was eventually conceded – but then they didn’t stand much of a chance in the face of my notes, my diary, and my precise recollection of timings and events. The one remaining open issue is that of the (lack of) social services cover when she was discharged, and this time, it was their notes that were detailed, and it would seem that the fault may actually lie with social services – the hospital will conduct their own inquiry on this one and let me know.
In short, the meeting was constructive and amicable, and they are looking to review, change and implement a number of things as a direct result of my letter. Woo hoo!
I feel so totally relieved to have got this out of the way – I don’t think I’d realised how much the spectre of it was hanging over my head. What with that and the emotion of last weekend, and the ongoing hectivity at work – think it goes some way to explain how low I’ve been this week. I hope so – I don’t ever want to feel that bad again.
Oh, and in case Neenie reads this – ‘fraid I went for the brown trouser suit option (it looked much better & I needed the confidence boost) – and I had new, sassy shoes to go with it!