What is the best story that a journalist can cover? What do we enjoy doing most?

It seems that sometimes, perception and reality may differ.

A recent comment on the visiter forums, from ianpeter, reads: "I wonder why it seems that so many will write about the negative things to do with the NHS. Yet ignore any news that is positive and which the trust and staff involved deserve a big pat on the back.

"Southport and Ormskirk hospitals have no reports of MRSA, yet hardly anyone has made an point to say well done. Yet in this week's Visiter we See yet another negative story about a child going to Ormskirk and being unable to get a certain treatment.

"A few weeks ago the local press reported about young boy who was told he had to go to Alder Hey, because as the paper said, there was no doctors available. Yet on closer examination of the story, what was said, was that if the child required surgery for a suspected appendicitis, there was no paediatric surgeon available. That was why the child was referred to Alder Hey, still not the best thing for a child's ER, but not as bad as it seemed."

In this week's Visiter we DO publish the story about the Trust's excellent continuation of keeping MRSA at bay - ahead of the story about the girl with the broken arm!

Indeed the Southport Visiter is always happy to publish positive stories about the NHS in Southport.

In this week's edition, we feature the good news about a children's centre due to arrive in Southport soon, on pages 1 and 3. The story about the Trust's superb MRSA figures were published on page 27, along with a photo of some of the staff responsible.

The story about the girl who broke her arm but could not be treated at Ormskirk Hospital appeared further back still, on page 31, behind the good news stories.

We felt it was newsworthy because when children's A&E services were removed from Southport six years ago, the main reason given was that better care could be provided at Ormskirk.

Any parent with a screaming child in the back of the car, in severe pain, faces a traumatic experience having to drive past Southport Hospital, and to Ormskirk, for treatment - that trauma is made worse when treatment is then denied, for whatever reason, with the parent then redirected to Alder Hey. No small journey in any circumstances.

We congratulate Sefton Primary Care Trust for their long-awaited decision to provide a children's walk-in facility in Southport. Many hundreds of parents in Southport will no doubt be equally delighted.

When it comes to good news about local health services, and about the successes of staff working for local health services, we are always delighted to hear about and report such great news.

As far as jobs go in Southport, these people are among the most respected in our community for what they do, and deservedly so. We will continue to showcase their efforts, their ability, their determination whenever and wherever we can - we are as proud of what they do as anyone else in Southport.

So if anyone out there hears of any good news story we should be covering - please let us know!!

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