Thursday, October 16, 2008

Alive and Kicking

A friend of mine recently told me that she occassionally pops over to my blog and that I haven't been blogging much at all. Like I didn't know!! Ha!

The truth is, there is a lot of things going on at the moment, family things which I don't want to bore people with and as this is probably not the most popular blog in the universe I have let things slide.

I must, though, sing the praises of the NHS. Until recently my Mum (82) , who is terminally ill, had been given quite a raw deal. It seemed that basically, she had been left at home to cope with dying without any medial intervention. The district nurse came in as and when, her GP was, and remains to be, utterly attrocious. I went to the GP way back in March and asked that she got a referral to MacMillan and was told that she would be referred when she was on her death bed. Wrong!!

A few weeks back my Mum was admitted to hospital with a chest infection. Quite frankly the word 'Newham General' conjours up all sorts of mental pictures for the residents of Newham, the first one being dirty and grotty. But I have to say that over the last few weeks of visiting I have seen a great improvement. It looks clean and the staff although busy, seem to take time with the patients. Better still, the social services and occupational therapist have swung into action to ensure she gets home as soon as possible with as much help as possible. Mum has been admitted to a lovely new ward where the facilities are great and with the help of my Dad she will be home soon. Better still the registrar has referred her to MacMillan so hopefully now we can get some practical help and bolster up my Mums confidence. Ultimately the end will come for her, but thankfully she will now not feel abandoned by the medical profession. So thanks Newham General, I eat my words, lets hope the GP takes note!!!