The Betrayal of Trust by Susan Hill

Author:Susan Hill [Hill, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-307-39917-5
Publisher: Knopf Canada
Published: 2012-01-02T16:00:00+00:00

Twenty-eight

‘I don’t have good news,’ John Lowther said. ‘The director, the medical officer and I have gone through everything. We have tried to identify any hidden reserves we can free up. There are none. Savings? We’re still in the process of identifying any more we can possibly make but frankly it’s unlikely. Everything has been cut to the bone and beyond the bone. A couple of support staff have taken redundancy, one nurse is leaving and not being replaced. another is due to retire next month. We can’t lose any more without compromising patient care and even endangering patient safety, which obviously we would never do. We have no other option. We have to close C ward – that is eight beds – and mothball it for an indefinite time. If we do that we can keep going, just about, for another three or four months, without an absolute financial crisis. The bank is being relatively accommodating – which in these days is quite something, you’ll agree. The PCT is not. They have no more money for us and they cannot bring any forward. Indeed, they’ve told us informally that we’re likely to have our support from them cut by 40 to 50 per cent next year. Cat drew in her breath and John Lowther nodded. ‘I can’t argue with your reaction,’ he said. ‘Other than that, we’re cutting the opening hours of the day care centre. Looking at either two full or three half-days.’

‘That’s completely inadequate,’ Cat said. ‘Given the health and safety and staffing level limits on numbers already, we can’t cater for much more than half the patients who would benefit from day care, which in itself saves us money. Quite a few people we manage to treat by a combo of day care and home nursing would have to become inpatients. Oh, for heaven’s sake, what are we doing here? Limping along. This isn’t anywhere near a proper hospice facility.’

‘I know.’ John Lowther sighed.

‘I’m sorry, John.’

‘Please.’ He raised a hand. ‘Feel free to vent your feelings in here. I am as angry as you are. I hope none of us ever has to hold back what we really think and feel, around this table at least. But, let’s look at something a little more hopeful. Leo Fison has begun his task. I am not going to speak for him but I feel a bit more optimistic about our finances now he’s in charge of raising some emergency funds. Leo.’

Cat had had a patient with alopecia a few months earlier, a man in his thirties who had been desperate to have a wig rather than show himself to the world entirely bald. Cat had tried to persuade him that many men now chose to shave their heads, that it was fashionable.

‘Bouncers and criminals,’ he had said. ‘I don’t care what it costs. I’m not demeaning myself by being a bald man before my time.’

She had wanted to mention the number of women, young women, sometimes beautiful, who had become bald after chemotherapy and who had refused to hide behind wigs.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.