Harrogate Hospital have responded after a Facebook posting of an image of a baby being treated in the Accident and Emergency Department of Harrogate Hospital was published online.
Jonny Trotter posted the image of his 10-month-old daughter having an ECG in the paediatric waiting room. In his post he was critical of the hospital performing the procedure in the children’s waiting room, a room away from the main waiting room. He also said that he was given the option to wait 2-hours or have the procedure done there.
Jonny Trotter declined to talk to the Harrogate Informer, insisting that he had an exclusive deal with the Sun and the Mirror for publication.
Dr David Scullion, Medical Director at Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust, said:
I have been in touch with Mr Trotter to apologise for the family’s experience in the Emergency Department.
Staff were acting in Mr Trotter’s daughter’s best interests.
It was an unusually busy night in the Emergency Department with staff working very hard in challenging circumstances.
Only the ECG was carried out in the dedicated paediatric waiting area.
All other care was provided in a private clinical cubicle when one became available.
We recognise that this situation wasn’t up to our usual high standards of patient care.
We are pleased that Mr Trotter’s daughter was able to be seen and discharged in two and a half hours.
13 Feb 2020 at 15:05, Jonny Trotter has requested include a comment.
Jonny Trotter aid:
My daughter got fantastic care from the nurses and doctors at the hospital and I honestly could not thank them more.
The reason I wrote the Facebook status was to stress how much the NHS is struggling with space and availability of beds.
I have often heard horror stories about the NHS but never witnessed this myself before. The only reason I took the photo was to send to my wife so she could see our baby was being cared for.
If the same thing happened today I would not change anything as my daughters health is my number one priority, I just want to raise awareness of the struggle that the NHS is under at the moment.
Once again, I want to praise the nurses and the doctors for giving my child the best care they could under the hard time’s the NHS is facing at the moment.
My daughter is feeling a lot better now after the fantastic care she got from staff at Harrogate Hospital.
