Until my recent stay on Ward 4 I had no idea of the threats facing my local hospital. My daughter was born there in 2003, and had an overnight stay there a year later when she had a reaction to her MMR jab and needed treatment. This January I was admitted with abdominal pain and vomiting on a Friday evening. The consultant gynaecologist was of the opinion that I was suffering from Pelvic Inflammatory Disease and started treatment for this. It took until Monday to have an ultrasound scan as I had requested, to rule out other possibilities and complications, because Withybush's award-winning radiography team don't work at weekends(!) On the ultrasound a tubo-ovarian abscess was detected and I was taken for emergency surgery that same evening. I had to spend a further three days on the ward after my operation, and am now recovering at home, with an outpatients appointment scheduled for early in March.

Having read the information available on your site, I am horrified to think that my case would have been one of the many Withybush would not be able to deal with after the proposed cuts. I do not drive, and neither does my partner. We live in Pembroke Dock. How on earth would I have got home after being discharged? My family would not have been able to visit me during the seven days I stayed at the hospital. If I had not had an ultrasound and been sent home on antibiotics, only to develop peritonitis, would I have survived a long ambulance trip up the A40?

I have my complaints and reservations about the way services are right now. The whole concept of 'Hospital at Night'; the fact that a lot of the 'healthcare assistants' employed by hospitals are *failed* home carers; the slipping standards of cleanliness in certain areas because of a lack of resources.. these are all of great concern to me as a 26 year old woman who hopes to have at least another 50 years of occasional hospital use in front of her. But the answer to my concerns cannot be to cut the number of hospitals! I want to have more children (preferably at Withybush, where I found my gynaecologist, nurses and midwives supremely helpful and caring during my first pregnancy and delivery), and I want myself, my partner and my children to have access to the medical care we need in case of illness and accidents.

Stephanie Kate Ashley, Pembroke Dock

My husband and I have been visiting Broad Haven since the early eighties both with our children, and now on our own. We visit Pembrokeshire for ten months of the year whenever we can and up until May of this year had never had the occasion to visit or use Withybush Hospital.

However, on May 27th my super fit husband was taken ill in Broad Haven, with what was later diagnosed as a Pulminary Embolism. Quite seriously ill two caring Broad Haven residents came to his aid and collecting me rushed us the 6 miles to Withybush. There is no doubt in my mind that if Withybush Hospital had been closed and services moved to Carmarthen that my husband would be with me now.

I just wanted to thank all of the teams involved with my husband's medical and nursing care over nearly three weeks that he was in Withybush Hospital and lend our voices to support your campaign. Thanks to all for your care and kindness

Accident & Emergency, M.A.U. and Ward 12 Consultants and Nursing Staff

Best Wishes

Lynn & John Bailey
Hereford

Quotes

Don't forget we've been through this thirty years ago...
We had a discussion about whether Pembrokeshire...
needed a good quality, District General hospital...
and in my opinion, all the arguments that were used then...
about why we needed a new hospital...
in the county of Pembrokeshire are still valid today.
You can't escape the geography...
We are out on a limb here in Pembrokeshire...
We have a growing population...
We need good quality hospital services...
located in the heart of the county.
Stephen Crabb MP

We give all our time for nothing...
and they are talking about cutting down...
and I think it is absolutely disgusting...
because we really need this in Pembrokeshire. With all the developments going on...
around Pembrokeshire, we need the hospital here and not thirty miles away.
Audrey Morris

You want to put it bluntly, i think it's crazy...
You have to bring the services to where the people are...
You can't move people around...
Move the population of Pembrokeshire...
and put a hospital outside of the county boundary...
Does seem to be unthinkable.
Somehow or other the services...
must be brought to the people...
That's the only way the Health Service can operate.
Councillor Bill Philpin

She was born nine weeks prematurely...
I'd have been in the low risk category...
after having a previous normal birth...
and yet she was born after a placentral abruption...
No warning,so if they change it I'd have had to go to Singleton...
and who knows if she would have survived that journey.

Protester

We need a public demonstration about this...
we could be having problems in the future...
what with the LNG and the Tourist features in the county...
If we don't make a stand on this and we loose this hospital...
we have got problems in the future...severe problems...
not just for the local population but for the tourist population...
and for the LNG workers...
I feel desperately sorry that they are even contemplating...
closing this hospital down.
Councillor Bryan

It's a very long way for any of us to go...
-If we are taken ill suddenly...and if we lost the hospital here we would have to go...
all the way up to Whitland apparently...
and if they have £350,0000 in the pot...
for a new hospital at Whitland, why not spend...
a couple of Million on ours and keep it open. We need our hospital in West Wales.

Protester

Well I think it's an absolute disgrace, quite frankly...
I've read this Designed to Deliver document...
and it basically tells us that it will downgrade services...
here in Pembrokeshire...I'm afraid that's why we are here...
today, to try and keep our hospital open...
and keep our health services local.
Paul Davies- AM candidate

I'm certainly not favourable to either one
that has been presented...but I am pleased that...
Chris Martin has said that people can present...
their own options and as such I urge people...
to present their option and that is to retain Withybush...
in its current state...but also for current services...
to be enhanced.
Councillor Thomas Tudor

I think it's absolutely ludicrous what they are suggesting...
to take services further away from people would...
I think be catastrophic.
Councillor Moira Lewis