OUR poor old NHS is going through a difficult time both locally and nationally.

Passed from pillar to post in terms of the political sway of government, it struggles to keep up with the different directions the successive ruling political parties try to take it in.

The current Conservative Government is presiding over a definite crisis in some quarters. You only have to take a look at the series of exclusive stories in The Argus recently over the non-emergency patient transport service to see that.

The trust running our Royal Sussex County Hospital is in special measures and, as we reported, is struggling financially and operationally.

The string of stories, when looked at in hindsight, points to a National Health Service being cruelly stretched.

We say cruelly because when our hospitals, failing in Eastbourne too, struggle, it is not the fault of the wonderful staff but the stress they are put under.

That is why it is all the more important and fantastic to recognise what is being achieved when a hospital is run properly and given better funding and staff numbers.

The Royal Alexandra Hospital for Sick Children in Brighton has a culture running through it that you only have to go there once to see.

Thankfully for our children’s sake any trip to see a doctor or nurse there will show you how much they care about their patients. The difference is that they have the time and the resources to invest in that care and see it through.

Return appointments are made and kept, people are remembered.

In short, doctors remember you and you feel like they have the time and energy to really analyse and check their patients properly and repeatedly.

Sadly in much of our NHS the wonderful staff are overstretched and overwhelmed.

Maybe it is time for places like the Royal Alex to be held up as beacons of how hospitals can be run fantastically well if the resources are there.