Grieving son critical of hospital hygiene (From Blackpool Citizen)

Grieving son critical of hospital hygiene

11:30am Friday 6th June 2008

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The friend and son of a Blackpool pensioner who spent nine days in Blackpool Victoria have criticised the hospital's approach to hygiene.

The resort resident, who was in her 70s, died at the hospital in early May, and her friend, Lynda Thomason, said she was left appalled after two unhygienic incidents at the Vic.

Mrs Thomason, 53, of Leyland, has asked us not to name the woman, who had lived in Blackpool all her life.

She said: "The first time I went to visit my friend, me and her son were sat talking to her, and noticed some dirt that was under her fingernails.

"As we started to clean it away, it soon become clear that the dirt was excrement, it was just disgusting.

"The second time my friend asked to use the commode, and I waited outside the curtain to see if she was offered handwashing facilities, which she wasn't.

"Two minutes later she is putting moisturiser on her face. I know the hospital are doing all they can to beat the bugs, but this doesn't look good.

"My friend loved Blackpool and had lived there all her life, it was so sad to see her like this."

The woman went into hospital at the end of April after she had stopped eating at home, and was becoming weaker as a result. She never came out of hospital after being admitted.

At the start of May the Vic became the first hospital in the country to introduce a new screening test for MRSA, and was also one of the first hospitals to complete a deep clean programme, following a £400,000 investment from the Primary Care Trusts.

The son of the elderly woman said: "I am sure the hospital are doing their best to combat MRSA and other bugs, but this is a basic hygiene issue that has gone unchecked.

"I appreciate staff are under huge pressure, but people should be hygiene conscious all the time, especially at hospitals. This was a very upsetting time for me and my family."

A spokesman for Blackpool, Fylde and Wyre Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said: "We cannot comment on individual cases due to patient confidentiality, however, we will investigate the concerns raised by the family of this patient.

"We would stress that all of our staff are committed to providing the highest standards of personal care to our patients.

"The standards of cleanliness at our hospitals is extremely high and we recently won a national award for the quality of cleanliness at Victoria Hospital."

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