Mike Peggie, Portering Supervisor
Portering supervisor Mike Peggie will be helping to make children’s Christmas Day special in Glan Clwyd Hospital, this year.
It is one of the many rewarding and sometimes distracting aspects of making sure the site continues operating, while the rest of us are eating too much turkey and Christmas pudding.
Over almost 21 years’ service to the people of North Wales, he often gets the Christmas Day shift – and he doesn’t mind in the slightest. At least this year he’s only working from 6am until 2pm, so he’ll get his Christmas dinner with his family after all.
However, helping to make Christmas Day special for children stuck in hospital on the big day, is reason enough to come in to work.
“Working Christmas Day, it's got its own rewards,” said Mike. “We do a lot with the kids wards. So a lot of the time a couple of porters will stick on Santa's uniform and we'll go down there and dish out some presents. It gets you in the spirit of things.”
If anything needs moving in the hospital, it will be porters who move it. They dispose of waste, sort the post, transport the deceased to the mortuary, shift furniture and supplies, deliver drugs to the pharmacy and much, much more.
The interaction with patients and visitors is what Mike really enjoys. As he explains, porters are often the first line of staff people see when they enter Glan Clwyd.
He said: “We give directions to people. We take them to appointments and we reassure them. We see everybody and everything. People see us and will come to us if there’s a problem.
“Sometimes there is a certain perception because people see porters sat outside the lodge. However, people don’t know what job that porter might have just done. Sometimes you need to gather your thoughts and have a coffee. I speak to the new porters and prepare them because the job can sometimes be tough.
“We take the deceased to the mortuary and we attend all incidents in the hospital, like cardiac arrests. You sit down after, you gather your thoughts, then the next member of the public asks you a question and you have to be your happy, jolly self again.”
Despite the difficult aspects of the role, Mike said he wouldn’t change a thing. That’s why, like in previous years, he’ll be trying to make Christmas Day special for young and old alike on the 25th.