On Fri, 24 Jul 2009 12:20:17 +0100 (BST), Dave Liquorice wrote:

On Thu, 23 Jul 2009 23:38:55 +0100, "nightjar".me.uk wrote:

The private hospital does seem to be well equipped; it has a laminar
flow operating theatre for example.

That rings the "marketing puff" alarm bell in my mind. I'd rather
know that the autoclaves are properly maintained and used correctly
so that all the bits of steel they stick in me are clean and sterile
and that their procedures for rotating stocks of consumables are
robust so nothing is "out of date" and that the prodecures for
counting all the bits in and all the bits out are similary robust.

Our local hospital had problems with outsourcing of its equipment
sterilisation and a number of operations had to be cancelled due to visibly
dirty equipment. This may have had something to do with the fact that they
gave my wife two, possibly three infections in theatre during an emergency
ceasarean - they admitted that that was the most likely source of the
infections. When she went back a fortnight later, feeling wretched, they
told us that had she come in a few hours later, she'd very likely have
died. As it was, they had great difficulty in getting antibiotics into her,
as her veins had begun to collapse.

I must admit that with the next child they treated her very well, even
providing a private room free of charge. Arrangements for equipment
sterilisation had been changed by then!

SteveW