'They're helpful, good humoured and caring' – the team reducing hospital admissions and ED waits
05.11.2024
Moving Glan Clwyd Hospital’s Medical Day Unit (MDU) to a larger ward could further reduce hospital admissions and ED waits, according to a clinical leader.
The MDU recently moved to Ward 19, formerly the Discharge Lounge, so it could see more patients needing routine procedures such as iron infusions, fluid drains and autoimmune treatments.
Unit manager Rebecca Lloyd-Lewis is keen to expand the service, which operates Monday to Friday, to help even more patients.
Rebecca, who started as a healthcare support assistant before becoming a qualified nurse in 2010, has been running the MDU since 2021. It treats patients who don’t need an overnight bed but do need medical treatment.
“Historically these patients would have been here for days,” she said. “Now they have the investigations, blood transfusions, etc and they go home. Our aim is avoiding people being admitted to hospital or going through ED unnecessarily.
“It’s such a fantastic concept and we need to get people to know it exists. If a patient with, for instance anaemia, sees their GP they then need to be referred to hospital to prescribe this service. It is about everyone using it and getting people seen here.”
It is clear the variation in conditions treated on the unit has major appeal to Rebecca, who is helped by a staff nurse but is hoping to expand her cohort with a dedicated healthcare support assistant in the near future.
She added: “One of the most satisfying things about this role is the feedback from patients, it has been amazing. Another is the complexity of the work. I have done treatments here I had never done before. It is really interesting.”
The department sees around 35 people each week, treating conditions such as iron-deficiency anaemia, haemochromatosis (a genetic condition where there is too much iron in the blood), infusions for those with autoimmune conditions and ascitic drains for those with fluid build-up, due to chronic liver failure.
One such patient who regularly visits the unit for ascitic drainage is Peter Lloyd, a 57 year-old former soldier living in Bodelwyddan.
The toll of having liver disease meant he had to give up work and he is under the care of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. He’s been on the transplant list with the hospital for nine months.
Peter visits the Midlands once every six weeks but he’s a regular with Rebecca and the team, visiting every 10 days for his treatment. He gave the unit his seal of approval.
“About 10-12 litres of fluid is drained every time I come in and I’ve been having this treatment for two years,” he revealed. “It takes between two-and-a-half and three hours each visit. The staff here are brilliant. They are really helpful and good humoured - professional and caring.
“I was in the Army for 22 years and I worked for Blind Veterans for about eight years. I had different jobs after that but I had to retire because of the liver disease. My tummy started to swell, my memory got worse and I got clumsy.
“I feel like they’re understaffed here and they should extend the department. It is fantastic.”
Karen Scrimshaw, Glan Clwyd’s head of nursing for medicine, is an advocate of the unit. She believes it can play an even bigger role in reducing some of the pressures within the hospital.
She said: “The work Rebecca and her team are doing in the MDU really does help to reduce some of the capacity issues in the hospital. By taking on these procedures here we are reducing traffic to wards, reducing unnecessary visits to ED and giving people a really good service.
“Expanding to this new ward space will allow us to help more people and relieve more pressure across the hospital. I’m really proud of the work they are doing.”
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