Gift: Reassurance and reflection

Today’s blog is from Wael Agur,Lead UroGynaecologist at NHS Ayrshire and Arran and Honorary Senior Clinical Lecturer at the University of Glasgow.

This year, our team has received many gifts on Patient Opinion.

We all consider these stories to be gifts, the positive ones are assuring we are doing the right thing and the negatives prompt reflection and wonder what could be done differently that makes us better in our jobs. We really enjoy hearing what patients think about the service we provide. The service from a patient perspective is often different from staff as patients see things that we don’t.

There are two stories on patient opinion that were the best professional gifts this year. They are both related to the gynaecological mesh implants, a large-scale medical problem this decade after metal-on-metal hip and the PIP breast implants. In Ayrshire, we pride ourselves in having a team approach for the management of adverse events suffered by some of our patients and those from other boards. In addition, before the emergence of the problem, our team has actively sought to introduce alternative surgical treatment of pelvic floor problems that do not use transvaginal mesh.

The first story: “Faith in Medical Profession Restored”. The story clearly confirms, how just listening to patients who suffered mesh complication and discussing all the available options, can restore the faith lost in the Health Service. A ‘friendly and interested’ attitude is sometimes all a patient needs from healthcare professional especially with long-term illnesses where treatment may not lead to cure. While the patient described her condition as ongoing pelvic pain due to nerve damage and appreciated there may not be cure, an experience with our team in clinic that day, made her make the effort to write such a complimentary post on Patient Opinion.

The second story: “Laparoscopic Colposuspension". this story highlight the ability of our team to offer an alternative to mesh surgery and highlight the importance of discussing all alternative options, those available in our hospital as well as those available in others. This clearly enhances the patient choice, promotes trust in the service and improves the overall patient’s experience. With concerns about mesh surgery, many patients may be putting up with their symptoms to avoid surgical intervention or taking a risk that otherwise they would not have taken if the problem was not too bad. Describing our hospital as “five star” was the best gift to our team and motive to do more and add value to what we do best, healthcare