To ask why people think it’s okay to abuse NHS staff?

Yes I am afraid seeing the patient as a problem rather than a patient is a result of some of their policies.
Eg. Go home ? Why not today ? With beds . The patient in a bed becomes a problem. And that pervades the attitude towards the patient.

The other problem is the tussle as to who is in charge of anything. Nobody seems to know.

It’s not ok to be rude, but at the same time I myself had a very stigmatising experience in hospital as a very vulnerable young adult. I didn’t lash out at anyone, but nobody was listening to me and I didn’t have anyone to advocate for me.

As I said, rudeness is not ok but your experience of staff are simply trying to do their jobs, is not always the experience of patients, especially if they have vulnerabilities. I do appreciate that some people are just short tempered, but I also think it’s a bit narrow minded to wonder why arguments may occur and feelings run high.

By the time a patient finally gets to speak to someone, they've probably already called several times, got answerphones, got "number disconnected", been passed from pillar to post by other staff, etc. They're stressed and frazzled.

The NHS is an absolute nightmare to try to get to the one person you need to speak to. No one else knows who that mythical person is, so they just randomly give you different numbers, mostly to fob you off and make you someone else's problem.

My DH has a "little black book" of names and numbers from his 9 years of being under cancer treatment, and even he struggles most months to get to speak to someone as the staff keep changing departments, numbers suddenly become unavailable, he sometimes leaves a message of "person x's" answerphone but doesn't get a reply because person x has left or changed dept of their phone number has changed, so no one even listened to his message! He spent the entire day on Friday trying to resolve a problem that was with a different dept, but linked to his cancer - must have made a couple of dozen phone calls to different people, being passed pillar to post, and then mid Friday PM, everyone had gone home, so it was a wasted day. He's started again this morning, but still not spoken to anyone - just a constant round of leaving a/phone message and phone ringing out not being answered (again several different numbers).

I have sympathy for NHS staff being abused, but can also see why so many patients have reached the end of their tether by the time they speak to someone, especially when that person can't help and just fobs them off too!

It does make it worse, because we are trying to help people in the NHS. I know retail staff do too, but someone telling you which aisle to find things on is not quite in the same ballpark as someone staying a hour after their already-long shift finished to help save your life from a pph.

What happened I am afraid is not probably anything to do with you but a frustrated reaction to feeling they are being passed from pillar to post. And when someone’s health is at stake people do feel more stressed than normal.

When faced with an angry member of the public you have to be aware of how you are feeling yourself, and how to try to lower the temperature.
Appreciating where they are coming from helps.

I have at times been frustrated by the NHS. I haven’t ever called anyone names though. Before anyone assumes, I am a huge believer in it. It does though need some change.

I have had someone tell me on the telephone they could not deal with my query as they were going home . It was 4.30. I asked if there was anyone taking over from them. No. To me that was unacceptable. Not even coverage until 5pm.
Another time I was told by an arrow to log my appointment into a machine. There was a receptionist right in front of me. Head down. After trying the machine ( goodness knows whose bright idea sold it to someone and how much it cost), told me to speak to the receptionist. Who promptly said, okay, take a seat.
I remember being seen by a consultant who I could not understand. Then I saw he was looking at a mans file. Not mine. I mentioned to the nurse who laughed and said ‘ oh you are right aren’t you’. I didn’t find it funny. It terrified me.
Being unable to get a doctors appointment at your local GP has become a norm.
Nurse, yes, nearly a doctor but not quite, yes. GP no.
There are many more negative experiences I have had.
They also saved my life once.

But what you experienced was probably the final straw that broke the camels back. From someone who is already anxious.

It isn’t acceptable for anyone to be rude but this goes both ways.

After a recent period of ill health where I have been condescended, patronised and been rude to for absolutely no reason by everyone from admin staff to nurses to consultants, I am now just the right side of civil (I am generally a really polite and friendly and understanding person).

For the last few years, being a patient in the NHS has felt very much like being granted a favour by a benevolent organisation rather than using a tax funded public service.

As someone who also works in a challenging, overstretched, public sector role, I would not get away with treating service users in that way.

She’s not claiming special status. Where does she say that?
She’s just querying rude behaviour, and mentioned she is NHS staff ??? Also it’s *they’re and NHS.

I dont honestly think that the way the NHS is funded will make much difference to people’s entitlement or the freedom they feel to abuse key workers. It might help with other things but not that.

People forget that some NHS staff also abuse their patients especially if they are disabled. I have been labelled aggressive rude, difficult etc just for trying to explain that being deaf means that I will not hear my name called for appointments, I have missed drinks and meals because I never even knew they were on offer, shouted at, told off... I was even woken up once by a.midwife screaming abuse at me because I had not woken to care for my new born baby that was crying, I had, of course, informed the ward beforehand that I was deaf which meant that I would not hear anything when I was asleep.
The NHS Accessible Information Standard is supposed to ensure that all patients with communication problems are flagged, with their communication preferences noted and used.
This is the NHS's best kept secret and the majority of hospitals are still not compliant. The buck stops with the hospital CEO. However, hospitals spend more money campaigning for Stone wall and the shades of brown badges than they do for promoting the need for reasonable adjustments due to disability. I have mobility problems too.
I do wonder how many cases of abuse of a NHS worked might actually be caused by the staff having abused a disabled or sick patient beforehand.
I am wary of apportioning blame unless I have heard from both sides of the story.

Explain why it is necessary...?

Four hours would be good where I am, the wait can be 18 hours

Dont think this is an nhs thing, its just working with the public, some of whom are twats essentially.

i work in a supermarket, ive had people scream, call me a cunt, throw things etc the joys of working with the public!

We’re the new retail staff in the NHS. Low paid and therefore we can be abused by those who expect us to help them. Footballers are more valued. There’s the sexist element too. Women, who are over represented in the nhs and admin, are worth nothing after all. So it’s low paid, so clearly low value, so men won’t do it. Round and round we go…

Lest we forget, the biggest users - and logically abusers too therefore - are that generation. Cue the complaints and self justification from them too.

I had it all the time when I worked for the nhs, I would refuse to see them again. I did get pulled up for it, but my manager always agreed with me.
My friend gets abuse in the vets where she works on reception.

@notafanofthisanymore I’m so sorry this happened to you. It’s unacceptable behaviour which unfortunately is increasing.

Society is at an all-time low, and people are stressed and feel more entitled. We also have a rise in fascism.

TBH I don’t understand why anyone feels they are entitled to be rude to anyone, no matter the tresses of their circumstances. It’s not just the NHS, it’s in shops, the hospitality industry, the way people speak to teachers.

I think people have lost the ability to engage in civilised discourse. I am perfectly capable of telling an admin/receptionist/server on the phone ‘that I am perfectly livid because of X, Y X’ but also that I know it is not their fault, so if there is anything in my tone I apologise as it is absolutely not targeted at them, but that I’d appreciate their help resolving the issue.

There is nothing wrong with expressing feelings of anger and frustration - but you don’t target that at another person and you don’t insult people.

Yes of course that is the rule - but 5 minutes arguing and enforcing iswasring my time and theirs and it’s the attitude that’s annoying.

You presumably tell them ‘ well we can’t do the scan then.’

I once had a student ask to leave the exam room early and when she saw me start to write the time of leaving on her script said she’d rather I didn’t do that. I told her it was her choice - stay the full time, or leave early and I write the time of her departure. No third option .

When I invigilate in school and a student walks off before their row has been dismissed, the dismissing teacher does not mess about. Sit back down- or leave and do the exam again in detention after school on Friday. No third option.

Jewellery off and have the scan. Keep jewellery on and no scan. As a society we need to enforce consequences, and it should start at home. Bad behaviour from a three year old leads to removal from the park /pool/ soft play. That way a child learns about consequences long before it becomes a serious matter. I have taught a few students over the years whose parents clearly never drilled this lesson into them. The result is that the consequences they faced were the loss of summer resit opportunities which means facing a retake year costing over £9k in fees plus whatever it costs them to live. So possibly approaching £20k because they ignored a rule about how much work needed to be submitted to retain resit opportunities. Every single time the student appeared astonished that they faced unpleasant consequences and that no one could get them out of it.

Presumably people think that swearing at NHS and other staff will result in no consequences, but that can’t be always the case as there have been cases of patients being removed from GP lists for poor behaviour.

I think it's the frustration, particularly if you are in a phone-loop-of-doom which many of us will have spent hours in, just trying to find out something basic.

Having said that, conflict training is standard in the NHS and I'm sorry you are feeling upset about this - it is part of the job now unfortunately. Please chat through with your manager about how you feel - conflict training is really helpful in both managing these conversations and preventing them, and also knowing how to process things afterwards. x

I'm sorry this happened OP. It's unacceptable, and 'it happens to all public-facing roles' doesn't make it okay, nor should it ever do so.

The NHS is meant to be 'zero tolerance' but the abuse and aggression I've witnessed (including from some patients towards other patients) is usually overlooked and excuses made. In extreme cases, on my old ward the matron would give a yellow card, and if a further serious offence created, they would be banned from that ward for the future. What does that really change?

Is there anyone you can escalate it to?

Hope the day gets better and people are more pleasant, or at the very least, not active arseholes.

Unfortunately people are getting a lot ruder in general everybody in public facing roles is feeling with this at the moment. In the NHS I know theres a lot of rudeness to staff by patients but there's just as much rudeness by staff to patients. Not in the OP's case just in general.

I would argue that the “special status” you get in the NHS is that people are often stressed, unwell, perhaps upset when they make contact with NHS workers, so the stakes are often already high when the communication begins. It is therefore prone to escalate much more quickly and end with a negative outcome for some or all of those involved.

Being unwell, anxious or upset is no excuse to treat people badly, but alas it happens and there are some idiots who will project their worries and frustrations, unhelpfully, on to others.

I wouldnt call it ‘special status’ but working in the NHS and similar settings provides a unique set of circumstances when it comes to dealing with the public.

Don’t be ridiculous, I was not telling people to go on a rampage. But if you repeatedly push people until they break, eventually they will break.

And don’t be so dismissive of “it was only a routine appointment”. We are constantly threatened with being removed from clinic if e miss an appointment, guilted into tying ourselves in knots to not waste “precious” NHS time. I spent three days trying to reschedule an appointment. I only get paid if I work. I was able to make some of the time up in the evening but not all of it. Maybe you are one of these fortunate people who can miss three days pay without consequences? Or maybe the reason it is so hard to get through to anyone is that you are all on the phone trying to sort out your own appointments? The system is not fit for purpose and no one seems to have the inclination to fix it. Right now I am missing another days work sitting on a corridor floor with DH waiting (at 11.15) for his 9.35 appointment. Navigating this shit is like a full time job. And I have to pay for the privilege. I don’t shout at staff, but I have every sympathy with the broken people who do. The staff here shut down years ago, and I can’t really blame them either. No one is treated with respect. The NHS needs be completely reformed, not kept limping along like a sacred cow.

This.

For the most part, the NHS is a bit shit (although there are some places where it shines), and working there doesn’t make you any better than anyone else (and I’m not saying you think it does!). I imagine this person speaks to retail workers, bus drivers, police and bin men in a similar way. They’re just dicks to everyone. I assume because they like unhappy lives.

i asked a patient recently to remove her jewellery ( safety issue for a scan ) and she said ‘I can but I don’t want to ‘
What do you do with someone like that?

Tell them that it's Hospital/Trust Policy and she won't get the scan done if she doesn't comply. If she doesn't like the Policy she should complain to the Chief Executive or whoever runs the whole show.

When I worked for the NHS I had little slips of paper typed out with the Chief Executive's name and 'phone number on. If anyone got too awkward I told them "I don't make the rules I only apply them" and gave them a slip telling them that this was the person in charge.

My attitude was that
a) I was in a clinical role only and
b) didn't get paid enough to deal with that kind of hassle.