Updated: Hospital Apologises After Patient Given Test Results in Costa Coffee

Published on: 18 Jul, 2023
Updated on: 20 Jul, 2023

The Royal Surrey County Hospital, Guildford

By Emily Coady-Stemp

local democracy reporter

A Guildford hospital has apologised after a patient was given his test results in the Costa Coffee outlet by the hospital entrance.

Update: See RSCH response below

The wife of the patient at Guildford’s Royal Surrey County Hospital made a complaint about her husband’s care and treatment in the emergency department.

According to Royal Surrey’s upheld complaints page, concerns were raised by his wife that “an infection was missed, the patient did not have an examination despite a lengthy wait”.

The complaint also said that his test results were shared in Costa Coffee café.

It appeared in a list of upheld complaints received by the hospital trust between December 2022 and February 2023.

The hospital apologised for the patient’s experience, and said “the care and treatment provided did not reflect the standard of service that the Trust aims to deliver”.

A written response by the hospital trust said the doctor concerned would be asked to reflect on how to improve the care and treatment he provided.

The response in full said: “The trust apologised for the patient’s experience and acknowledged that the care and treatment provided did not reflect the standard of service that the trust aims to deliver.

“The trust’s response indicated that learning had been taken from this complaint and that the doctor concerned will be asked to reflect on how the care and treatment he provided at the time could have been improved.”

A spokesperson for Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “We strive to be transparent with our community, publishing patient feedback and any learnings we have made on our website.

“We have, of course, apologised to the patient directly when they raised their concern. We have learnt from this case and shared with our teams how care and treatment provided at the time could be improved.”