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2007 - May 2nd - Wednesday


JEANETTE HIPSEY’S EVENTFUL TRIP TO THE ROYAL LONDON HOSPITAL!

JH set out from home at 8.20am but had to rush back from outside about No 54 to collect some change as she had forgotten that she had to pay her bus fare to the Railway Station – her Senior Citizen’s Pass not being valid until 9.30am.  However, she arrived with about 7min to spare at the Station and had time to use the lift to get to the distant platform in order to catch the 8.55am train.  The outgoing journey was uneventful; JH purchased victuals from the Buffet which was open; the train arrived on time at Paddington – at 12.21pm.  JH caught an underground train to Edgware Road where she caught a Hammersmith Line train, almost immediately, to Whitechapel.


 

JH arrived in the Renal Outpatients Department of the RLH at 1.15pm: JH had blood taken by Staff Nurse Vicki Dunsmore; JH also received a cheery ‘Hello’ from Staff Nurse Caroline Rolfe, whom JH had met in February.  Vicki escorted JH round the corner to the ECG Department; JH had her fourth – all told – ECG which looked OK to JH, and which JH took back to Vicki.  Vicki told JH that Ray was not on duty that day but would be around on the following day; furthermore, Ray would be coming over to the X-ray Department in order to escort JH over to the James Hora Home, after the angiogram.  JH went to the first floor to search out the X-ray Department in the Alex Wing so that she did not get lost early the following morning!

JH reached James Hora Home at about 2.45pm: Ruth and David, the two Wardens, welcomed JH in a most friendly manner.  David, showed JH round the Home (in between answering the phone both in his office, and the extension by the entrance to which ‘professional’ calls quite often are made (instead of the office phone): on the ground floor there is a kitchen in which the necessaries are provided for a ‘continental breakfast’ such as cereals, milk, bread, jam, and of course tea and coffee; a piggy bank was provided for donations towards the provision of these.  JH apologised for not having mentioned it before, but she explained that she ‘boiled under the bag’ under a duvet!  JH was shown her en-suite single bedroom on the first floor which could be reached by a small lift – insomuch that JH together with her large wheelie could only just fit in, and David had to walk up the stairs!  David found two cellular blankets, and a valance for JH to use as a top sheet; David observed, as he put the duvet on top of the shelving, that the Housekeeper, Gloria (query name) would not need to put a clean cover on - thus making no difficulty about JH’s last-minute request.  JH said that Ray had told her that the Home is a charitable organisation and that it had been suggested to JH that an offer of £30 a night would be acceptable to the Wardens; David was most surprised - as he said that, although he reckoned that it cost £30 a night per resident, in actual fact, only a donation of about £10 a night was suggested. 

In any event, after unpacking JH returned to the sitting room where she read the folder which contained a very full ‘Information Pack’ all about JHH:

Address: James Hora Home, The Royal RLH, Whitechapel, London E1 1BB
Located opposite No 37 Ashfield Street, behind the Hospital
Wardens, ie, Managers: Ruth S and David P

History of James Hora Home  In 1791, Sir William Blizard, a Physician at the Hospital, was so dismayed at the appalling, impoverished social conditions in which his patients’ families lived around the Hospital that he set up the Samaritan Society (not to be confused with the Samaritans).  In 1903, after the Society had been in existence for over a century, Joseph Hora donated a large sum to the Society in memory of his deceased wife – with the proviso that the Society was named after his wife thus: the Marie Celeste Samaritan Society; the Society also received a large bequest from Joseph Hora in 1917, on the latter’s death.  Subsequently, the Home – named after Joseph Hora – was set up in one of the Hospital Buildings, and the present building has been refurbished 2 years ago.

During the evening of her arrival, JH was very disturbed by a car alarm going off – she had seen a vehicle with all its indicators flashing when she walked to the Home; furthermore, David told JH that there were some sort of Police Call System fairly close to the Hospital, and that the local children had discovered that they only had to kick the post nearby to set the alarm off repeatedly.  JH ate some tea in the Hospital Restaurant and, yet again, the car alarm was ringing – and this went on for about 5 hours altogether: JH resorted to moving her bed right away from the window. 

Finally, JH went down into the Lounge at about 8.00pm – where the noise of the Alarm was less audible; whilst she was sat in the Lounge the residents’ phone rang and it was answered by another resident who had been eating her tea in the kitchen: the phone call was JH’s sister, who was very pleased that she had found JH so easily!  JH said that the accommodation was really comfortable – except for the noise of the car alarm; Ann said that, as she had managed to track JH down. she would not necessarily phone tomorrow, but that all her family hoped that things would go well the following day. 

Shortly after Ann rang off, the car alarm stopped.  In the eight or so hours that JH had already spent at the RLH, JH had seen and/or heard the Air Ambulance Helicopter arrive - on the helipad built on top of the Main building - at least 4 times.  JH slept very well; the curtains in her bedroom were thick velvet and excluded a lot of the traffic noise as well as the light.



 
 
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