A HEALTH chief has apologised to a frail pensioner who had to be rushed to A&E just hours after medical staff sent him home from hospital.
We reported in your Worcester News in July how 87-year-old John Chambers collapsed in a chair semi-conscious two hours after he was discharged from Worcestershire Royal Hospital.
An ambulance had to rush Mr Chambers to A&E on Sunday, July 13, and he was there for the next six weeks.
John Rostill, chief executive of Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, has now written a letter, apologising.
In a letter to Mr Chambers’ son Ron, Mr Rostill says: “I am extremely sorry for the time it took your father to be seen by the physicians when he came back to the hospital.
“This was due to demands on their time in other parts of the hospital but it is not acceptable and I sincerely apologise for the upset and distress this caused.”
Mr Chambers is now at home in sheltered accommodation in Chelmsford Court in Ronkswood, Worcester, where he is being looked after by carers. At the time his son said he was “disgusted” by the way his dad had been treated after he was first admitted following suspected pneumonia and a stroke.
However, Mr Rostill did not directly apologise for the decision to discharge Mr Chambers in the first place.
He wrote: “All members of the team felt your father’s condition was improving, and your father said that he felt better and was keen to go home. Your father was happy to be discharged.” In his letter, Mr Rostill confirms Mr Chambers was brought back to A&E at 3.15pm on the same day he was discharged.
He was referred to the medical team who originally discharged him but, after being treated, did not see anyone again until 6.45pm.
Mr Chambers wants a public apology for the way his father was treated by hospital staff.
He said: “How many more people out there are being treated like this? My dad shouldn’t have been discharged in the first place. If he had been on his own, without his family, that could have been fatal.”
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