A Lanarkshire hospital patient has received an apology from the local health board after being admitted to an A&E room with a floor covered in blood.
The patient, who asked to remain anonymous, is a health professional and told our sister title the East Kilbride News that the blood-covered room at Hairmyres Hospital was ‘nothing short of negligence’.
The room also contained a used sick bowl with a face mask in it from a previous patient, as graphic images taken at the time show.
A friend of the patient, who attended A&E with her, said: “The room just clearly hadn’t been cleaned down.
“The materials used to treat the patient prior hadn’t been disposed of properly and my friend was asked to sit down right next to the sick bowl.
“She had to bring it to the attention of the nurse who cleaned it down, but didn’t really give any acknowledgement about the severity of the issue.
“We all appreciate the work our health care professionals do, and we know that these are particularly tough times, but this was just negligence. What I would say though, is this is not reflective of all NHS premises or work.
“I find this singular incident immensely concerning and, unfortunately, it can’t go unacknowledged.”
Deputy director of hospital services, CJ Graham, said staff "make every effort" to ensure patients are protected from any type of risk at Hairmyres.
He added: “We exercise due diligence ensuring all appropriate infection, prevention and control measures are in place.
“We regret any instance where we have failed to provide the highest standard of care and we have monitoring systems in place to help us understand compliance with control measures and ensure any areas for improvement are highlighted.
“We have a formal complaints process and we would always encourage anyone to contact us in this way if they wish to raise any concerns to allow them to be fully investigated.”
