Geordie Doctors Dispute Patient's Advice

Link: RedOrbit

          Hospital doctors in the region are at loggerheads with a patient support group over a booklet it has published on MRSA. Patient group MRSA Support has produced a leaflet called MRSA ( A Patient's Defence urging patients to speak up if they believe hospital staff aren't doing enough to halt the spread of the superbug. But medics at Newcastle Hospitals NHS Trust ( which runs the city's RVI, Freeman and General hospitals ( have described some of the information given as "excessive and unnecessary" and fear it could lead to confrontations between patients and hospital workers. Dr Steve Pedler, director of infection prevention and control at the trust, has written to the Department of Health to make the Government aware of the document, and wants the MRSA Support group to change its contents. "The leaflet has clearly been written by a person with strong feelings on this topic," said Dr Pedler yesterday. "Some of the advice within it is sensible and reasonable. Some we would regard as excessive and unnecessary, but not actually harmful, while some is inaccurate or could lead to confrontation with trust staff." But yesterday, Tony Field, a founder of MRSA Support and author of the booklet, stood by what he had written.