Five days to surgery
My chest sounds a lot clearer today so I have to say a big thank you to everyone on this thread, if it hadn't been for you lot I'm certain I would have cancelled my surgery, my default mindset is to think of others before myself and I would have been thinking how awful it would be to get to Dday and then have to pull out. The wasted theatre time, the potential for numerous spinal ops to be carried out if I give enough notice, the huge team involved in my surgery twiddling their thumbs on the day.
My SATS could be better, 90% which would leave a normal person feeling rubbish but I'm used to running that low and lower. I've been visited by Elsa the cat who seems to sense the my dgd is coming (it's her cat) and is very excited. Lola has just bounced
I finished writing detailed Christmas lists last night, along with detailed instructions about what to do when.
This year we won't be participating in the living advent calendar for our village, it was a close call last year with me making the decorations from HDU, we ended up with the three kings in the form of the dog, giant rabbit and tortoise. I haven't mentioned the tortoise, he's in his 90's but we've only had him since 2008, bought from a reptile rescue centre he had been owned by a lovely man who'd had to move into residential care. He's a leopard tortoise and has never hibernated so he lives in the house during the winter, hangs out near the Aga and is a grumpy old man in a shell. He won't be coming on the bus because he bites people's toes and once a week empties his bowels all over the kitchen or garden room floor, tortoise shit is evil, really evil so he can stay at home.
Yesterday we were discussing dental hygiene and the fact that good old fashioned nursing seemed to make it far more of a priority than modern nursing. I will now tell a truly shocking tale of poor hygiene in hospital which unfolded on the spinal ward following one of my surgeries. There was a young lady in my bay, let's call her Mel, she'd had surgery three weeks before being readmitted with a serious wound infection, had required a general anaesthetic to have the wound debrided and cleaned, when I arrived she had a vacuum pump fitted to the wound. She was very unwell and taking lots of pain relief, she was also being offered (as was usual on the ward) a sleeping tablet during the last drug round which often didn't happen until 11:30pm or later. Every morning without fail Mel would be comatose and when she was asked it she was having a wash she would mumble "no I want to sleep" she always missed breakfast and would eventually surface in time for lunch. The only visitor she had was her boyfriend when he wasn't working and could catch the two buses to coincide with visiting times.
They were judged, without a doubt by nurses, hca's and to a certain but lesser extent by doctors. When I had observed for five days and knew that Mel hadn't washed, changed her pyjamas or brushed her hair or teeth I spoke up. I had a quiet word with one of the more experienced hca's and told her. I was shocked at the response "it's up to her, if she doesn't want to wash" I suggested that maybe she did but because she was always asleep nobody was offering to help her later in the day, the hca suggested that maybe Mel was just one of those people who never washes which is how she got a wound infection in the first place.
I spent time chatting to Mel, she'd grown up in care, had no family, had mixed with a bad crowd and lived on the margins of society until she met her boyfriend. He too had grown up in care, he worked hard to provide for them, they lived in a small flat and Mel had been crippled with back pain for several years and unable to leave the flat.
Her surgery had been a big operation involving breaking vertebrae and having numerous rods inserted, she was discharged home on day four post surgery and readmitted under blue lights. She'd been ill for over a week a gp had diagnosed flu over the phone, she hadn't been seen at home by a district nurse for a wound check and her boyfriend sought help from the lady downstairs because he was worried, she phoned for an ambulance.
I spent some time chatting to her boyfriend and asked if Mel had any clean nightwear, wash things, she didn't but he said he would bring some in, they were obviously not blessed with the biggest brains in the world, out of their comfort zone and didn't really know what was expected of them.
I had taken my concerns to a senior nurse and then to the ward manager, I was told to mind my own business, by now Mel hadn't washed or changed her pyjamas for almost two weeks, I encouraged her to ask for help getting washed in the afternoons but she was painfully shy and was never going to speak up for herself. She now had wash things, clean pyjamas and I'd been down to the shop and bought her dry shampoo and a hairbrush. That evening, I brushed her hair and put it up in a bun, gave her some baby wipes and helped her change into clean pyjamas. The next day her consultant ordered the vacuum pump removed and I decided I would email him and suggest he got the nurses to help her wash first, I went to have a shower and when I returned the pump was removed, I did email her consultant who came and spoke to the nurse in charge. Mel was given the mother of all bedbaths but later that day developed a temperature, started vomiting and was clearly very unwell. I sat and watched, seethed to myself, felt guilty. It was me that went and helped her rinse her mouth and clean her teeth, moped her brow, phoned her boyfriend. She was moved to a side room, went back to theatre for more debridement.
Mel ended up in intensive care with sepsis, a hole in her back which took ten months to heal, she's needed skin grafts to close the wound.
I went to see her boyfriend at home, they had nothing, a feted mattress on the floor, one sheet, a duvet with no cover, no washing machine, few possessions, they didn't claim the benefits they were entitled to because they were both barely literate.
Mel was a tragedy waiting to happen, she shouldn't have been discharged on day four to go home and sleep on the fucking floor, they had no pillows, no carpets, nothing. She should have been seen by a district nurse, gp, anyone who could have stepped in and supported them. They were just two people doing their very best when the world had crapped on them from a great height their whole lives. The whole thing left me seething.
I helped them move into a fully furnished flat before Mel was discharged, they received a gift of bedding, towels, pillows and a second hand laptop loaded with software to help them with basic literacy and numeracy. They were put in touch with a lovely solicitor and their case has settled out of court, my diary was used as evidence. We're still in touch, they are lovely people, they just needed someone, anyone to give a crap about them. Mel is at college, she's doing seven gcse's and loving learning, she's predicted high grades and wants to go on to study and become a counsellor working with care leavers. She's transformed into a bright, outgoing, caring young woman, her boyfriend has learnt to read, drive and has been nurtured by his employer once he learnt what was going on in his personal life. They are two people I'm proud to call my friends. Our NHS was able to neglect and almost kill Mel, nobody cared because they were labelled as sub human by the very people who should have cared most, shameful and telling their story has made me cry.
Dgc have just arrived, the bowling alley awaits. Have a lovely day.