Old, ill and lonely: the answer is loving carers

FOR the past three years I have seen the inspirational side of the health service as the staff of Sonas 3 ward in St Patrick’s Hospital, Fermoy, went about the repetitive daily grind of caring for the most vulnerable patients in a state of partial or total dependence.

Debilitating illness in old age is a lonely place. Not only is there a keener awareness of imminent mortality, but a deep sadness at being a burden on society with nothing left to contribute, a feeling, as the modern idiom puts it, of being “a waste of space”.

How fortunate and blessed are the patients in that category to be entrusted to incomparable care of the Sonas 3 ward staff.