By Judith Phillips, Reporter

Back from holiday in Italy this week, it seems the perennial thorny topic of cleanliness in our hospitals is at the forefront of the news again.

In recent years I've done a good deal of hospital visiting, as various members of my close family have been in-patients at all three of our local hospitals, and it is apparent that much has been and is being done to improve standards of cleanliness and hygiene.

Nevertheless, both our district general hospitals at Bangor and Bodelwyddan still have problems with MRSA, although thankfully Llandudno Hospital seems to have a much better record.

But at all three hospitals the overriding impression is one of overstretched staff struggling to cope with the day to day demands of often overcrowded wards. Their expertise and professionalism can't be questioned, but anyone who has seen them trying to meet the demands imposed on them must sympathise.

Contrast this with my family's latest hospital experience when our granddaughter was suddenly taken ill while we were staying in a small town on Lake Garda in North East Italy and it became clear we needed to seek urgent medical advice.

We made our way to the nearest hospital where an English speaking nurse in the accident and emergency department directed us to a larger hospital with a paediatric department some 15 miles away. At the A&E department there, we were seen immediately by an English speaking triage nurse who processed our granddaughter's medical card and sent us straight to the paediatric department where, within a couple of minutes, despite it being a Saturday evening, she was examined by a doctor who instigated treatment to deal with the breathing problems she was experiencing.

Within an amazingly short space of time she was moved from the treatment room to a cot in a room which also contained a bed for our daughter and had en suite facilities. The first thing that struck me as I walked down the corridor to see them was a strong smell of disinfectant. When did you last smell that in a British hospital? It may be argued that equally effective odourless cleaning products are now used, but there was something strangely reassuring about that distinctive odour of Dettol.

Our granddaughter was treated at the hospital for a little over 36 hours and in that time cleaners were constantly visible on the corridors and popped in and out of her room frequently, emptying waste bins, mopping the floor and generally keeping an eye on cleanliness. There weren't any bottles of antiseptic gel hand cleanser visible either in her room or the corridor, but perhaps they weren't needed?

The nursing staff went quietly about their duties and didn't seem as stressed as their British counterparts. My overall impression was that this state run hospital in Italy was perhaps behind its British counterparts in terms of hi-tech equipment and technology, but had more front line staff and was still being run along the same lines as our hospitals were around 20 years ago, with the emphasis on getting the basics right.

And it was strange to hear an American woman, married to an Italian, tell my daughter: "Here they like to keep you in hospital until they're absolutely sure you are well enough to go home. It's easier to get into hospital here than it is to get out of it."

Does that apply in Britain? I don't think so. For our overstreched hospitals, freeing up beds often seems to be the priority, and of course we do have "care in the community", don't we?

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