Health centre in a sorry state

AS a recipient of nursing care for more than six months at Bantry Health Centre, it is obvious that the premises in which the nursing staff are expected to treat patients is wholly inadequate.

The number of staff who are expected to share two “examining” rooms which are too small and too cluttered to even give cursory treatments is a joke.

The room has old carpeting which should have been discarded long ago.

The walls are peeling from the damp that permeates the building.

Not only the elderly are affected. Mothers must bring infants into these unhygienic areas and then undress them so that the nurse can administer vaccines or other procedures.

Having to climb rickety stairs to converse with a nurse in an office setting is equally daunting. Just observing what six nurses have to put up with in cramped, poorly-equipped offices is an eye-opener.

How can so many personnel get by with one — yes, one — computer in this day and age? Or what about sharing telephones? It’s the same story more or less.

If there was a board of health, this building would have been demolished years ago and the staff would have been given medals for working under such conditions. As a patient it has been interesting to sit in what is euphemistically referred to as the ‘waiting room’. This consists of several chairs lined up against a wall and to reach a buzzer, one has to skirt carefully around boxes of supplies.

The buzzer sounds upstairs where a nurse has to come to the top of the stairs to find out who needs help.

Meanwhile, the patient sits and waits in the draughty, damp room before being taken to one of two tiny rooms for nursing care.

I cannot overemphasise the friendly, professional care that is given by each and every nurse in the centre. It is just such a pity that in this day and age they must work under such dire conditions.

These dedicated people and their patients deserve decent premises and good working conditions.

I’m sure more people receiving care would agree — even the infants who have yet to find their voices.

Pauline F Derby

The Coach House

Marino Street

Bantry

Co Cork