Norovirus cuts short planned hospital visit

Her frail mother Doris Carter from Highcliffe is a patient in a Royal Bournemouth Hospital ward closed by the Norovirus outbreak.

Judie, 60, who lives in France with her archaeologist husband Steve, 62, said: “I felt so near but yet so far away when I rang to be told that visiting wasn’t advised.

“Steve recently underwent a minor operation so I knew that if I contracted the virus I could pass it on to him.”

But, following a meeting with their mother’s consultant yesterday morning, Judie and her brother Bryan Carter from London were allowed to briefly visit their mother.

She said: “It was lovely to see her on her birthday and help her open her cards. But we couldn’t give her a birthday kiss. Mum is being well cared for and it put our minds’ at rest.”

However Judie branded the patient phone service “appalling,” adding: “People are being exploited. When I dialled the number to mum’s bed from France I had to listen to a load of waffle, at my expense, and a warning about what the cost of the call might be.

“The phone is out of mum’s reach and a nurse had to hand it to her which is a waste of staff’s valuable time. We won’t know the cost of the call until we return to France.”

Earlier this week the Daily Echo revealed how PatientPower is planning protests to highlight “excessive fees” charged for hospital bedside TV and phone calls.

Yesterday four hospital wards and one bay at the Royal Bournemouth Hospital remained closed to new admissions and visitors were asked to stay away unless “otherwise arranged by the nurse in charge”.

Avonbourne elderly care ward at Poole Hospital remained closed to new admission s yesterday and is likely to remain shut until the weekend.

At Dorset County Hospital in Dorchester two elderly care wards remain closed to new admissions.

A survey of NHS staff has shown that 67 per cent received infection control training during the last year, 17 per cent had done so more than 12 months ago and nine per cent received no training.