Access Community Health

The carers are wonderful people, however the service coordination is abysmal, dismissive and demeaning. According to Access own policy 2 carers are required for lifting mum for showering and dressing. However regularly only one arrives or two arrive at different times. Multiple attempts have been made to resolve this without success. A formal complaint to the HDC is about to be initiated.

The support workers are very nice and caring. But there is a coordinator should go through training of how to talk to people, she is rude and impatient and agressive, as if she’s working at CIA and speaking with top- down tone of voice.

Management are aggressive,rude,demanding and do not care for their clients or their workers. They are the worst management i have ever dealt with.You sit on the phone for at least 15mins every time you try to call them. The co-ordinator loves you until you say no then she is nasty and degrading. CHCH.

Referred to by Christchurch Hospital. Advised district nurse will need to see me 3-4 weeks. First week great and the following weeks, customer service stops answering phones in an efficient manner. Wait times can be up to 1 1/2 hours just to confirm someone will come over. It is never clear or certain, yes no? I don’t know? You end up talking to the manager of customer service who gives the impression she is interested in hearing what you have to say and then when you start advising them of what has happened, the tone changes and you are forced to hear the customer service manager out who advises that their district nurses don’t “sit around” well neither do patients. You are forced to listen to the customer service manager and you try to work with them because now you have to or the call is disconnected and your made to feel like you are exaggerating the situation without it being said. Now the customer service manager changes the tone again and gives the impression they care about your situation and advises the Regional manager will be in contact. Really, it just feels like they just want to get you off the phone so they can work in the next issue. The district nurse who rudely entered my house uninvited without notice probably will not get spoken to and will continue to treat the poor clients this way.What some of these Access Community Health district nurses do not realise is I act in the capacity of a support worker who has worked on site and out in the community helping individuals with intellectual/ mental disabilities. I also work with registered nurses to provide high level needs because there is a need and it is something I am highly passionate about . All registered nurses I have worked with have always been professional and respectful. This is the first time I have really accessed the “public” health system for myself and it is the first time I have really needed the help of district nurses for wound care. Note, this was a referral from Christchurch Hospital. Unfortunately, the level of respect and compassion that I afford to the clients I have serviced over the years has not been returned to me by one disgusting district nurse whom I have asked to leave my home. There will always be one bad apple who will try and spoil it for the really hard working district nurses out there who are genuine. I never asked for the red carpet to be rolled out or asked the nurses to bend over backwards. Infact, I took the whole week off to try work with the district nurses because I appreciate what they do. I also communicated constantly with the customer service team almost every day. It is hard because you can not be certain if what you are saying is being recorded in the system because after 2 weeks of advising customer service of my availability times so the nurses can coordinate their schedules. It seems to fall on deaf ears or it was never recorded so you find yourself calling in every day. As mentioned above, first week was great. Each day you contact customer service the wait times increase because they can see who is calling so not sure if they are avoiding answering the call due to it being too hard to deal with or? Access Community Health just does not have the capacity to cater to the referrals by Christchurch Hospital and don’t know how to deal with the call then have protocols In place to do so but don’t ignore calls because it is too hard.If there has been a complaint lodged about the service provided by Access Community Health? Then you really need to explore why you are constantly having these issues?. Note, if you are tired of being a district nurse or what you do with Access Community Health ? Look for that role that would better service your needs but don’t take your problems out on the client. The attitude I received by an Access District Nurse? Implied she was tired and unhappy with her role. This unprofessionalism needs to be dealt with by management within Access Community Health to establish whether the behavior this district nurse displayed in my house is in line with their core values.

I had an excellent time with Access. All of the nurses where friendly and polite. They visited me for around 6 weeks and I was pleased I had them for support.

The carer we have had 3 times a week for 2 years is amazing and my one star rating is in no way a reflection of her. HOWEVER like SO many other comments on here the back off coordination is abysmal. Usually I get called within a few hours of the carer being due if she is away even though it is planned leave they have know about for weeks. And despite them knowing they have no one else in the area they can provide instead. But the worst part is the coordinating supervisor, I felt some relief when I read others reviews that I was not alone. The person I dealt with was rude, aggressive, did not listen, spoke over me, has zero compassion, and above all acted like the questions I were asking were those of a spy trying to gain top secret government information I had no right to. Simple questions like 'the only carer in my area has resigned effective 2 weeks time will you have someone else or do I need to look elsewhere for support' were answered with 'I can not disclose this information to you'. Round and round we went with me asking simple questions and her responding in riddles. While talking over me and telling me I was being unreasonable. It was absolutely disgusting and completely unhelpful but now apparently not unusual behaviour. Fire her before more damage is done. I can't even imagine how she interacts with staff if that's how she speaks to clients.

My mother was discharged from hospital 8 days ago (Monday 2nd October) The day of her discharge we had a meeting with a coordinator from Access. We were told someone would be in touch the next day to arrive a time for a nurse to come out and oversee mums medications one a day. A person in the office called on Saturday 7th October to see if a nurse had been in contact. She was surprised we had heard nothing. It’s now Tuesday 10th and we still haven’t heard anything. Scary to think such an incapable organisation is in charge of vulnerable people’s care. It seems as long as they have their side of the paperwork done they’ve done their job.

Access lady's have helped my father for around 3mnths now. We have found all but one of our carers to be very professional and show dad the respect he deserves.These ladys (apart frm the 1 lady) go beyond the written care plan for dad and do a lot of extras. The exception to the rule is 1 carer who wen I asked via communication book to use the prescribed hydrcortizone cream instead of moisturizer, she told me that dad should not b using hydro cream and that doc is wrong to give dad the cream that actually works for his prob. This neg woman is well past retirement age so seriously access bosses......get rid of her as she has had numerous complaints made against her but still she keeps her job. The oldies need carers whom actually do care, do the work, dnt complain and whom dnt call my father an old codger because his mobility is not so hot.She will not wear her uniform, choosing (on this particular day) to wear an unironed cotton dress that needed a damn good iron.But pls understand it is only the 1 lady who's not so great at her job, where all the other girls I cannot fault, the r GREAT thanks access.Oh reliability... spot on. We havnt had a missed day since starting. Another home help company dad has had coming for over 2yrs nw r very unreliable and many mondays have been missed for housework.Access havnt let us dwn with missed days,so folks if reliability and professionalism rwhat u want, Access all the way....thanks girlsLinda field

As with many other comments here, access's organisational skills are shocking! Four weeks in a row they have cancelled within hours of the cleaner arriving without having made a time for the cleaner to come in the first place, usually ringing just after 7am. My mother is still in bed asleep at that time of the morning. She has told them today not to bother coming cos they're so unreliable.