"Great nurses, but poor consultants"

Anything else?

My dad was recently treated at the pilgrim, initally in A&E who were fantastic, and was then moved to the Clinical Decisions Unit, where the care he recieved was very variable. There was one execellent nurse, who kept us as informed as she could, and was clearly looking after my fathers best interests, but I was very disappointed in the consultants we saw. One consultant came to talk to the family and rather than explaining the issue and what our options were, he just kept asking what we expected the outcome to be, in fact during our converstation he asked questions, but never gave us any information. One question we were asked was around our views on resusitation, this was asked very bluntly, without care that it was a distressing subject for the family. We responded that we would want our father resussitated, only to discover later that the medical team recommended that should the need arise they would recommend over-ridding our decision and listed him as DNR. Another consultant I spoke with barely spoke english, and even the nurse taking my dads blood pressure at the time struggled to understand him. I'm pleased to say that my dad has responded well to treatment, despite the consultants, not because of them.

I have a lot more I could add, but just want to say that the nursing staff in general are brilliant, but better communication with specialists and consultants could greatly help both patients and their families, especially when dealing with life threatening illness.