IN THE WARDS

Hospital Radio Perth is as committed to visiting patients in the wards as it is to providing a radio service. The whole point of hospital radio is to bring a little cheer to those who are feeling low. The patients have a number of entertainment choices, including Radio Two and Radio Scotland and while our presenters are excellent, they cannot hope to compete with the resources available to the professional stations. Yet invariably, Hospital Radio Perth gets more hospital listeners than all the other channels combined.

All the other stations are excellent at what they do, but they don't have our ability to be local, with news of what's going on in the hospital and throughout Perth and Kinross. In particular they can't hope to compete with our personal service, our ability to visit our listeners before and during the programmes. It's the patient visiting aspect that is the main strength of the 300 hospital stations throughout the United Kingdom.

At Perth we have about 50 members and over half have never broadcast. They are, primarily, ward visitors. Volunteers who head off into the wards to chat to patients and collect requests. We feel that the value of visiting patients should not be underestimated. Often, an elderly patient might be 30 or 40 miles from home with little prospect of regular visits and it's our volunteers who can bring a little cheer by sitting down for a blether for five or ten minutes. Sometimes relatives and friends can't call and it's the hospital radio member that cheers up the one person in the ward with no visitors. Many of our members now keep in regular touch with patients who have become personal friends.

We've had patient requests from as far afield as Australia, New Zealand and the USA - in fact, not long ago we had a request from Alaska!

Just imagine how that must cheer up a patient, hearing a "get well" message from their grandson who they haven't seen for many years.

But that's not all we do. Over the years we have broadcast whole programmes from within a number of wards and elsewhere in both hospitals and we have had a number of well known people visit the wards. The day that members of the Scottish Rugby squad visited was memorable and the afternoon that The Singing Kettle put on a private performance in the children's ward was great fun, but nothing matches the evening that Daniel O'Donnell went ward visiting. Even the nurses were gobsmacked. Years later, we are still regularly asked whether he's coming back!

The ward visiting crew at Perth Royal Infirmary range from teenagers to pensioners and are a fundamental part of the successful hospital radio team. No matter what sort of day you have had, you can't fail to be cheered up when you walk into a ward and a patient says, "I was hoping you'd be in tonight." So often patients tell us that they have been looking forward to our visit, or how much they have enjoyed the programmes. There is no doubt that there is a great deal of job satisfaction to be had from helping out at Hospital Radio Perth.

We never forget who our listeners are. We survey the patients regularly to establish exactly what sort of programmes they want to hear and adjust our service to suit. Of course we hold a smaller, more informal survey every time that we go round the wards collecting requests.

The charity is always on the lookout for more volunteers. Whether you can offer a few hours each week to visit patients or whether you fancy learning to present programmes, operate the computer system, help fund-raise or assist our engineers, Hospital Radio Perth will offer training, support and encouragement and a lot of fun along the way.

Hospital radio means getting out and meeting the listeners, stopping for a chat, listening to what they have to say and providing the service they want to hear. It's about providing a friendly face and We believe that is exactly why Hospital Radio Perth has been voted the top UK hospital radio station on three occasions. We don't pretend to be the world's most professional broadcasters, but we do make every effort to meet our listeners' needs - and have a great time doing it.

If you are a music lover who enjoys meeting people, then Hospital Radio Perth would be delighted to hear from you.

Visit our CONTACTS page to find out how to reach us.

DALENE RADIN RECALLS HER THOUGHT PROVOKING EXPERIENCE WITH ONE PARTICULAR PATIENT...

It was a 'routine' ward visit that Monday evening - the usual pattern of chatting to patients, visitors and staff as I went around the ward.

Then I met a lady (I'll call her Meg) who had been admitted that day. "Hello, I'm from Hospital Radio," I said. "I haven't got a radio," was the reply (which wasn't really unusual) so I showed her the headset and did the demonstration of how it all worked. By now I'd acquired another four potential listeners in that room!

"We have a patient request programme tonight - would you like to hear a favourite piece of music or singer/band/choir tonight?" The response was fairly typical - "I can't think of anything," so in an effort to focus Meg's thoughts, I asked if she had a favourite KIND of music. "I'm not sure," she said; my husband is really into classical music, but I think I'm a bit frightened of it because of the level he's at." (This was Radio 3!) "OK, let's try something simple tonight - how about some film music?" We settled for the theme from The Gadfly (Shostakovich) and I carried on with the ward visit, gathering a further five requests in that room and starting a lively discussion on various types of music.

Back to the studio then, to look for all the requests and later to do some research for my own programme - the Classical Collection - going out a few nights later. But I couldn't get Meg out of my mind; why should she (or anybody else, for that matter) be scared of classical music? I decided I had to do something about it, so I went back to the ward after the Gadfly theme had been played, to hear what she'd thought of it.

When I walked into the room, Meg's face lit up - she had really enjoyed the music and wanted details so that she could get the disc. She didn't believe me at first when I told her it was a classical piece by Shostakovich - and that set off another big discussion in the ward! We talked for a while, then I suggested that Meg should listen to the last part of my programme later that week. I promised to play a classical piece that she would find difficult NOT to like - "The Swan" from Saint-Saens' Carnival of the Animals. I described the lovely cello solo with piano accompaniment which easily conjures up a picture of the swan gliding along the river, it's also a very relaxing piece of music.

When I'd finished my programme, I went up to see Meg and asked her if she'd liked it. In fact, her smiling face told me before she spoke that my plan had worked! "That was just gorgeous," she said. "Right," I said, "let's try something different next week." And so began a gentle introduction to the world of classical music and the development of what was to become a very special bond between Meg and me.

The weeks went on and I found that my classical programme was reaching out to Meg in a way that I could not have imagined. Each time I went see her after the show, I could see her becoming weaker. My many years of service as a nurse and midwife, together with my own experiences of being a patient, have made me very perceptive to others and I am acutely sensitive to the needs and fears of patients. This has done me no harm at all in my work with Hospital Radio Perth and hopefully has been helpful to my colleagues at the station.

One evening when I went to see Meg I found that she had been moved to a single room, she still welcomed me warmly and was keen to continue to explore the classical field. There was Bach (Jesu, Joy of man's desiring), Beethoven (Moonlight Sonata), Mozart (Exsultate Jubilate and Allelulia), Barber Adagio (choral version) and much, much more. Then one Thursday, Meg was very tired, so she decided she probably wouldn't stay awake long enough to listen. We had a wee chat, then I left her to rest.

Thirty six hours or so later, I was in the ward again, delivering programmes for a concert we were broadcasting live the next day. As I walked past Meg's open door, I glanced into the room and was shocked by the marked change in her appearance - then she saw me and beckoned me in. She was so weak that she could only whisper, so I knelt down beside her to hear what she so much wanted to say - and then she whispered "Thank you so much for all that beautiful music. You've made my journey so much easier" (and she knew very well where that journey was taking her). I simply could not move - I didn't know how I was to get myself out of that room without breaking down. So I stayed where I was, on my knees and just held her. Then she said "I think I'm going to be sick." Here was something I COULD deal with, so I helped Meg and told the nurse in charge.

What then? Well, I took off out of that ward and ran all the way back to the studio (nearly 3/4 of a mile) fortunately it's downhill most of the way! I was so glad that there was nobody else in the building when I got in, for it took me quite a long time to compose myself. I don't think I have ever felt so humble as I did then and all my professional experience helped me not one bit at that particular time!

Meg died a few weeks later and is now at peace. I attended her funeral and was moved to tears again when one of the classical pieces I'd introduced her to was played during the service. This has indeed been a very special event in my life. I've thought many times since then that if I never do another thing in Hospital Radio, that one experience will stay with me for the rest of my life.

But that's precisely why we do it, isn't it?