Hello my name is

Castle Hill Hospital Oak Tree 

 Its nearly exactly four years ago since I noticed , really noticed this tree. It was bereft of leaves , winter was in full bareness and my mother was beginning her last journey away from earthly life.

Autumn is still clinging on here in East Yorkshire this week. From the train , and from bus windows today, the sun has caught the remaining beech and alder leaves, and those on this  mighty oak . I've not been proficient enough to catch the sun playing on the leaves still aloft . I've not been alone today , as spouse has had to lean on my arm on our very slow progress around hospital grounds, and purposeful expeditions to bus stops and so I have not been able to dart and swoop with my   mobile camera and catch the sheer emphemeral gold of the last leaves.

We have been to Castle Hill Hospital many times recently , and spouse and I are so glad for all  that modern medicine and the NHS are doing for him . Setting aside all the lost letters , the constant regurgatating of Colins case histories at every meeting that is. They always believe us when we  tell of the procedures and ops of the last 25 years , and that does worry me . Do they ever check up that we have got it right. Sometimes I feel like a Ward Clerk myself , my own book of notes and timelines ready to help C answer the questions asked at the  form filling beginnings to each visit. What would happen if we made it all up ?

There has been a sea change in Bridlington Hospital, Scarborough Hospital and now in Castle Hill Hospital . Until she died I followed Dr Kate Granger

@Grangerkate  on Twitter. Twitter is for me the easiest of forums on Social Media for keeping up to date with things that interest me. I followed her day to day tweets about her terminal cancer.  I did too with John Diamond in  his  newspaper column in the Saturday Times Something for the weekend in the late 90s until his death in 2001. I've not got a morbid interest in the diaries of Cancer patients, but a familial one as  my sister battled with a rare Leukaemia for over 20 years until she was cured, YES CURED.

Kate Grangers legacy is wonderful, as you may read here in the Hello my name is website . Every health care professional in the last 6 months has introduced themselves with the simple words Hello my name is , yesterday we met Jodie first , and beloved , already anxious and apprehensive was immediately put at ease, and that continued with the next few professionals doing his pre-med . 

How simple, how cheap, how transforming and what good manners is a simple introduction. 

Thank you !