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City councillor Sanne Dijkstra-Downie, who is standing in Edinburgh Northern in the Scottish Parliament elections next May, said cost-cutting was “obvious everywhere” and the care of child patients, such as feeding and washing, relied heavily on parents. Speaking at the Scottish Lib Dem conference in Glasgow at the weekend, she said: "My kids mean the world to me. And when one of them was diagnosed with cancer, at the age of 6, that world turned on its head in an instant. “For one, long, rollercoaster year, we became intimately familiar with all that is good, and not so good, about our Scottish NHS.” She said she wanted to be clear that she had no reason to doubt the excellence of the medical treatments her daughter received from the NHS, which ultimately led to her recovery, or the commitment of the doctors and nurses. But she said: “What we did see was a system that was under immense pressure, with cost cutting being obvious everywhere. “It sometimes showed itself in little things, like how there were never enough pillows for parents staying over on the ward. “The food for the kids was often of such poor quality, that we still laugh about the thick chunk of bread with a hint of tomato paste they called ‘pizza’. "Every little ‘extra’, such as a cup of tea or a biscuit for exhausted parents was provided by charities, not the NHS. “And yet we found that the entire system of care for children in hospital – the feeding, the washing, the toileting, sometimes even keeping track of medication – relied heavily on parents. I expect many were struggling with their own mental or even physical health, but no one talked about that – we were simply expected to get on with it. “No doubt this is a familiar story for many people caring for loved ones, and something that needs addressing society-wide. Meanwhile, nurses were either run off their feet or spending seemingly endless time inputting data into antiquated computer systems. There never seemed to be enough of them.” She said staffing problems were not confined to paediatric cancer care. “In June of this year, the Royal College of Radiologists reported that Scotland has a 25 per cent shortage of radiologists and a 19 per cent shortage of oncologists. They described the situation as a ticking time bomb. “We all know how important early diagnosis is to outcomes, and yet the SNP have failed to meet their own cancer waiting time targets in over a decade. And while they say they are recruiting more medical staff, the real problems lie not just in recruitment but also very much in retention of staff, from radiologists to GPs.” Cllr Dijkstra-Downie spoke of the importance of people having access to primary care in their own community. “Having to wait weeks for a GP appointment simply isn’t good enough,” she said. “If I get elected as MSP for Edinburgh Northern I will continue to put pressure on the Scottish Government to fund our GPs properly, to fund our NHS properly, so that our residents can access the care that they need and deserve, because Scotland deserves better." Don’t miss out on the Capital’s biggest stories with our daily newsletter, which highlights the latest news. From breaking news to crime, business, local politics, sport and more.
