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KING’S LYNN: QEH praised by religious group

Staff at Lynn’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital are leading the way in providing treatment for patients who refuse to have blood transfusions.

The praise has come from a religious group whose leaders say the QEH is now the hospital of choice for many of their members in the county.

In a letter to trust managers, Steve Scurrell, chairman of the Hospital Liaison Committee for Jehovah’s Witnesses, said: “We have heard good reports,not just on the planning involved in caring for those that require non-blood medical management, but of the kindly way that the staff deal with individual patients.

“For many Jehovah’s Witnesses in Norfolk, the Queen Elizabeth Hospital is now their hospital of choice.”

For the past five years, patients who are giving birth or undergoing non-emergency operations have been referred to the trust’s anaemia clinic before they are admitted if they do not wish to receive blood or blood products.

Once a patient’s wishes are known, staff draw up a blood plan and specific concerns about treatment can be discussed with a consultant, or a midwife in maternity cases.

Haemotology specialist nurse Claire Atterbury said: “In the past the decision to refuse blood has been seen very much as the patient’s problem. We have turned this around so that it has become our duty to seek a solution.

“Medicine has evolved and we have changed our mindset. We will not turn patients away. We want to be inclusive.

“We are now recognised nationally and internationally for the work we have been carrying out in this field.

“It not only makes humanitarian sense, but good business sense for us to develop our expertise. It means we are able to reduce the demand for blood where safe alternatives are available.”


 
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Weather for King's Lynn

Sunday 19 May 2013

5 day forecast

Today

Sunny

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Temperature: 9 C to 18 C

Wind Speed: 16 mph

Wind direction: North east

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