Last week, the Health Inspectorate Wales published its report into the accident and emergency department at the Grange University Hospital.
While the report made for some incredibly disappointing reading, I was not surprised by much of it.
I want to stress that I have nothing but respect our NHS staff who work tirelessly under incredibly stressful and challenging conditions, but the fact remains that the Welsh Government and health board must urgently get to grips with the current state of healthcare in our hospital.
It is clear from the report that the staff at the hospital are doing their best, treating patients in a polite, professional and dignified manner, however their work has been drastically hindered by the sheer number of patients at the department.
What is important is that we remember behind every statistic is a person in need of medical attention waiting to be seen and this report highlights some incredibly harrowing stories.
One patient spoke about how, despite having a suspected heart attack, they had to wait twelve hours before they decided to leave and drive to a different hospital.
Another lady with a suspected heart attack had no observations over her twelve hour wait and never saw a member of staff over that time.
It is clear from the report that the board must work to improve patient flow through A&E and the wider hospital which is clearly not sufficient. The lack of flow is clearly contributing to the backlog in A&E care, which is a much wider systematic issue.
While there is a lot of work still to do, I do want to welcome the improvements to staffing retention at the Grange.
Ensuring that we can retain our NHS staff is an incredibly important aspect of patient care, and I am glad that the situation has improved since the last HIW report.
However, it is clear that more will need to be done, and I will be raising this issue in the chamber with the First Minister at the earliest possible time, ensuring that the Welsh Government works with the health board to improve patient flow.
At the end of the day, we need to ensure that patients have the best quality care possible, and it is down to the Welsh Government to make drastic improvements across Wales.
Peter Fox MS - Monmouth
