Have you ever had occasion to go to the Royal Sussex County Hospital? Chances are you have, because if you’re reading this then (a) you live in Sussex and (b) one is not exactly spoilt for choices when it comes to hospitals in Sussex. And this is a pity for you because there are only, according to the NHS’s own league tables, seventeen hospitals worse than the Royal Sussex in the entire UK: it’s 117th out of 134.

One wonders why, and what can be done about it. Why: I suspect a massive amount of mismanagement. The place is vast, as you know, and that has to increase the chances of confusion when it comes to one department –A & E, say – communicating with another – the Surgical Assessment Unit. Or, indeed, the SAU communicating with my GP Surgery (the very excellent Montpelier Surgery, for whom I have nothing but praise). As I write, my GP is still waiting for paperwork at least a week old from the hospital, the paperwork they did send over was both inaccurate and incomplete, and when I told the doctor I was seeing that the Royal Sussex didn’t exactly seem to be at the top of its game, she made a kind of face which said: “I know exactly what you mean, but it would be bad form to say such a thing about my colleagues.”

It took them four days to diagnose me with gallstones; and they tell me it will be six months to a year before I can be operated on. That’s quite a long time to wait when you’re in constant pain; pain mitigated by a combination of paracetamol and the kind of drugs that the packet tells you not to take for more than five days in a row, in case you become addicted. Joined-up thinking doesn’t seem to be a speciality of the place, but I am grateful for these painkillers, let’s get that straight.

There was a nice young man handing out sandwiches to the wounded in A & E around nine o’clock in the evening; by that stage I’d been there for ten hours. At least I had a cot to lie on. (I am very glad I didn’t choose the cheese sandwich option: it would have played merry hell with my gall bladder. That’s another thing they might want to reconsider.) And I have to say all the staff, obviously overworked as they were, were also very nice, with the significant exception of the Registrar who finally delivered the diagnosis: he had – let me put this politely – all the charm and patient skills of an American customs official, and also failed to send me away with any information or discharge notes, which is apparently a big no-no in hospital circles.

What are your experiences of the Royal Sussex? I’ll bet loads of you have had worse experiences than mine. I don’t know what can be done to make things better, but we have to start somewhere.