Gift: Reinforcing positive experience

Skin Conditions Campaign Scotland has been an enthusiastic reader of stories on Patient Opinion. Their Director, Sheila Hannay, blogs about the gifts stories bring to them and their work.

A story that stands out for us here in Skin Conditions Campaign Scotland was posted on the Patient Opinion Scotland site in August by ‘JCost’ who spoke out about the excellent care they experienced from the nursing staff in Ward 15 at Monklands Hospital.

Sharing their experience was particularly powerful because this ward is one of a very few exclusively dermatology wards remaining in Scotland. As NHS Boards come under financial pressures and are short of emergency beds, dedicated dermatology wards and beds have been lost in some Health Boards and other Health Boards are actively considering doing so. We are concerned that increasingly people with severe skin conditions are being treated in general wards without access to specialist dermatology nursing staff.

As we work for improvements in choice, treatment and care for people with skin conditions in Scotland, the personal experience, such as that shared by JCost, is invaluable. So well done, JCost , and thank you again for the gift of your story.

It highlighted and reinforced the positive experience of being cared for within a dermatology ward entirely dedicated to the best possible treatment of skin disease and where 24/7 care is delivered by specialist dermatology nurses and doctors skilled and experienced in addressing both the practical and psychosocial needs of people with severe skin conditions.

It is vital that people continue feedback on sites such as Patient Opinion and tell their stories, share comments or raise issues and concerns and by doing so they feel confident that their story has been heard, is responded to and learned from and, where required, there is change and improvement.

Certainly, Skin Conditions Campaign Scotland feels strongly that more people must speak out about their experience of dermatology if they wish to retain the highest quality, specialist and effective care that they want and need.