Money well spent

Regarding the story concerning £661,000 spent on televisions at Forth Valley Royal Hospital (Observer, August 9), I was not surprised but disheartened by the MSP’s view that this was an appalling decision.

He clearly hasn’t spent any length of time as a patient in hospital and enjoys being named in sensationalist news.

The spend has been over two years and as a capital expenditure that is likely to have a lifetime of seven to nine years. I think this expenditure is critical. As a chronic sufferer of Crohn’s disease , I have had more than 60 stays in hospital, of various lengths of time, throughout my 20s and 30s.

In older hospitals, with no TV or wifi service, I felt like I was in prison, feeling isolated from the world and depressed. This was not the environment in which one could feel better.

Since becoming a patient at FVRH, I felt lucky to receive a bed that had a television set: a window to the outside world which I still felt a part of, with entertainment that would lift the spirits and help time go by.

I don’t think you can put a price tag on any effective service that provides positive wellbeing for any sick person in hospital.

Providing a TV is also a way of treating a patient with respect and allows time to themselves which is rare in hospital. It humanises the patient, something that is likely to be removed in stark, barren, and basic hospitals.

I was delighted as a patient to find a clean, modern and comfortable room where I was free to watch TV, charge my phone and use wifi.

This allows patients to keep in contact with loved ones and frees up time for nurses who would normally have to answer hundreds of ward telephone calls from anxious relatives.

It is a stark difference from the dirty bedsheets, paint-peeling grey walls, mouldy showers, and holes in the patient privacy curtains I experienced in hospitals in my 20s in Glasgow. At the time, prisoners had nicer digs.

I think we are too fast to judge and criticise NHS spending when we don’t see the whole picture. Healthcare should not just be about bandaging things up and providing the bare minimum life-saving treatment. Meeting the therapeutic needs of a patient, which includes TV, speeds up recovery, thus freeing up beds and therefore saving money and cutting waiting times.

Thank you to FVRH for investing in my mental health.

Anne-Marie Martin, Stirling