One frequently reads letters by patients praising the excellent and professional way they had been treated by the various medical sections of Mater Dei Hospital.

One department that also deserves a word of praise, even though it is not strictly one of the medical sections, is the hospital’s transport section, which provides a service that is often invaluable to outpatients.

The public bus service to the hospital is very good but, at times, patients who are elderly or handicapped find it difficult to get to the hospital without help.

The transport section, if asked to do so by the department which the patient is visiting, will collect the patient from his house, help him board, handle wheelchairs when necessary and help in every way possible to make the trip to and from the hospital as easy as possible. The administrative side is also handled professionally by ensuring the patient’s house is always found and by calling the patient the day before his appointment to assure him transport will be calling for him in good time.

I have used this service myself and, along with the other passengers, have always found the driver and his assistant courteous andvery helpful.

Which is why I find it difficult to accept that, on occasion, the patient to be collected fails to advise the transport section he would be using some other method to reach the hospital, oblivious of the fact that the driver would have wasted precious time to locate him.

A simple phone call to the relevant department would have prevented the driver making a useless trip and enabled other patients to get to the hospital with minimum delay.