CHRIS GREENWELL sings the praises of Darlington Memorial Hospital, and I owe my life to the care and skill of the staff at this hospital, but my opinion is that these outcomes cannot disguise the fact that the hospital is past its sell by date.

Only 15 miles away is an underutilised hospital at Bishop Auckland. Why is it reasonable to transport people from Bishop Auckland to Darlington and not the other way? I know from talking to staff which hospital they prefer to work in.

The Memorial is gloomy, not too clean, poorly equipped and managed.

Furthermore it seems to be rather more interested in managerial systems than patients.

In August 2015 I had successful life-saving surgery there but this was due to the skill and dedication of the staff despite their woeful working conditions. In 2015, I walked in as an out-patient for serious bowel surgery only for an inexperienced anaesthetist to take two hours and 20 minutes to put me to sleep and then only after I had threatened to go home.

In most normal hospitals patients go in the night before, have a pre-med and go to theatre relaxed.

The ward had six beds but really should have had four as maximum.

Staff were constantly barging into one another. The automatic beds were constantly malfunctioning because the lack of space led to staff inadvertently dislodging the plugs.

The toilet shower room off the ward had no natural daylight or extraction fan.

In 2016, my terminally ill wife was obliged to wait in A&E for four hours despite being neither an accident nor an emergency, simply to comply with someone’s system.

Forty-eight hours before her death, despite the sister specialising in chemotherapy complications wanting my wife on a ward, this could not be guaranteed because she had to follow due process and go through A&E.

My wife declined and precious time was lost.

In my view, the management should be paraded to have bed pans thrown at them.

VJ Connor, Bishop Auckland.