Sherwood Forest Hospitals Community Update | 28 June 2021 | Update 21

Posted Monday, June 28, 2021 3:48 PM

28 June 2021 – Update 21

An update to patients, communities and partners of Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS FT

Hello,

Whilst these past months have seen Covid-19 infections in our hospitals drop, the challenge for our colleagues continues, as we work hard to treat patients who have had tests or treatments delayed whilst we managed the pandemic.

Like all NHS organisations, we now have a longer waiting list of patients than we would like and some patients are waiting longer than we want for non-urgent tests and procedures. In the past weeks we have written to every patient who is waiting for an appointment, to let them know that we have not forgotten about them, that we are working hard to manage the backlog in order of who needs to see us most urgently and to give more details about how to contact us if needed. We hope that this has provided some reassurance and we are sorry for the delays.

We have restored all our services and we are working at pace to treat people as quickly as possible. In Nottinghamshire, our local NHS system successfully bid for £10m from the Department of Health which we are using to help us to tackle our backlogs and we are working on a range of projects to enable us to see patients as quickly as we can.

We know and understand that people have found the past 15 months difficult, but in some instances, we are seeing frustration and anger spilling over into mistreatment of our colleagues. We will not tolerate this, and we will take robust action if any of our colleagues are physically or verbally abused or discriminated against. NHS teams are here to help you and we will do everything in our power to protect our colleagues. Where appropriate, this will involve calling the police.

Whilst we have seen some instances of behaviour which has saddened us, as always there are many more examples of patients and members of our community who have supported and helped us. Particular thanks go to Corporal Gary Cardwell, who is taking on a 50 mile walk, wearing a 50lb backpack to raise money for King’s Mill Hospital, in memory of his mum, Amanda, who he says was given ‘outstanding’ support from our colleagues at the end of her life. I would also like to recognise Gurbinder Bains, who ran 50 miles in a month and raised £3500 to buy Playstation consoles and games for patients on our children’s ward after her son was treated with us.  Thank you to both of you and to the numerous other people in our community who offer their time, expertise and support.

Best wishes for the week ahead.

Paul Robinson Signature

Paul Robinson

Deputy Chief Executive

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