BAME WOMEN IN HOSPITAL

[LizzieKane2000]

Hello

I have had terrible experiences in hospital.
I was misdiagnosed and have suffered a decline in health due to Doctors failings.
I don't want to go into details.
But I do want to ask if any BAME women have also had appalling experiences - then gone through the complaints system.

I also don't like the term "BAME"
I'm not looking to debate this.

I also am not here to "prove" that BAME patients suffer health inequalities - look up stats pre covid if you want to go there.

@GrumpyHoonMain

I recently gave birth in a hospital where all the maternal and baby deaths were BAME despite BAME only being 5% of the local population. In my case baby almost died because nobody listened to me when I asked to be induced earlier for specific medical needs. I pushed for an induction at 40 weeks which is why my baby survived but I would have had a totally different experience had I been induced from 37-39 weeks.

The reason?

My condition (a very common clotting disorder in India but one that is rare in the UK and as such disregarded by the NHS) doesn’t flag up as requiring extra care on the system. I was consultant led, had a whole team, had specific medical conditions, but pushing for the induction was still regarded as a MH issue. The fact that I have an English accent and am confident with medical matters means my baby has survived - had I not been I would have had a stillbirth.

I think next time I will definitely try to get some kind of private maternity care. If only because money seems to be the equalizer when it comes to BAME care.

Thank you. I'm sorry you went through that.

This is it - we have the confidence and English to speak up.
But it's tiresome, it's also heartbreaking to think of what my Mums generation went through.

I wish I could say to you don't waste your money on private maternity care - the nhs is great for all.

@1ForAllnAllFor1

And to quote

“In this country we shower in the morning”. When I didn’t shower before the pediatric nurse came in because I had given birth 6 hours previous and was lacking sleep and I was producing large blood clots that another midwife was concerned and needed this stupid one to come in.

But I was quite polite and dismissive as all I wanted was to get home safely. But I feel angry at myself for not saying something back at the time to put her in her place.

Don't be angry at yourself.

She has been in that position for years -
You just had a baby.

Please complain.

If your a woman you will be ignored

Thank you everyone for all your comments.
I get that this is an emotive subject for all ethnicities. But it is easier to disregard the complaints of a 42 year old Bengali woman (Mrs Begum) from Brick Lane than it is a 42 year old white woman (Mrs Johnson) from Chelsea.
I’m not looking to start a race discussion.

I won’t go into details of my own case because it’s still ongoing.
But please if you read this and you are thinking “fuck her I had a terrible experience and I am white”
Please complain.
Not even for yourself – but for all the patients that come after you.

If you have poor English or you "think" you have - please complain. There are groups that will help you.

Know they will fob you off when you complain but persist.

One of my concerns is that when we complain we don’t know and don’t have access to information about how many patients have made the same complaint before us.
You will no doubt be aware of Ian Patterson.
This is an example of a case where if patients knew that there had been previous complaints about him they could have got together and I think stopped him sooner.
Also warned other patients.
Say for example you complain and they (PALS/GMC/NMC) disregard your complaint with no investigation, if you are “complainant number 7 or 17…” you don’t even know that until years later when that Doctor/nurse gets struck off or action is taken against them/the hospital.
Again, money is a factor here. Most of these issues come to light when the hospital Doctor is sued by someone with wealth.

In my own case my concern wasn’t and isn’t the financial compensation it is that it is ongoing and if someone had followed this through as much as possible I may not be going through this hell.

There has to be patient group/ policy/law a place where we can know the names of NHS staff that have been complained about before. (even the ones that were not investigated)

So when our complaints are not investigated we have the power and confidence to say “I know this Doctor did this to two other patients before – you have that complaint”

So what can be done to change things?

It infuriates me, not only because of what I’ve seen professionally but in my own life.

I’m 1/4 Indian - so just light enough to get away without being treated like crap myself. English name etc.

I’m pregnant and when I was waiting for a blood test last week I could hear the midwives speaking on the phone at the desk.

After one call, one made the comment about how the woman she was speaking to was from a culture where she wouldn’t turn up for tests and if she did her husband would probably be one of the ones who insisted on trying to get in the budding “as they are controlling in that race”.

There were a few other nasty comments.

I’ve also noticed that I get spoken to more by the staff. I’m smiled at when being called in for an appointment, they will make jokey chit chat. BAME women tend to be ignored.

And I did get the Midwife’s name who I overheard on the phone, and I did email the supervisor of midwives and PALs, cc’d in the trust executive for good measure. She said some horribly discriminatory things about the woman she was speaking too, loudly and in an area full of patients.

@1ForAllnAllFor1 if you go private you will get the same consultants just doing private work. You actually need a consultant who has clearly not received all their medical training in the UK

In my case my obstetrician was an Indian woman who still had an accent and I don't know what she wrote on my medical records but it pissed off a white junior doctor as they had to take good care of me.

It didn't however stop the white British staff ignoring my requests when I was being induced and only listening to what my white male partner said.

Interestingly my own and a non-white male friend's issues with non-treatment from GPs weren't with white GPs. We both ended up moving practices to ones with BAME female GPs and we live in different areas of London. We both have the impression our treatment was due to our perceived education level due to our addresses as well as our ethnicities.

Mine was at a GP surgery.

I fully believe that it was because of my age and race. The response was the biggest load of bullshit in support of the GP.
I guarantee that if I was a white woman in her 30’s I wouldn’t have been treated the way I was.

I’m so sorry OP & everyone else who’s experienced similar - including people who don’t feel confident enough to post.

Seriously debated responding as I didn’t want to clart up your thread, but given the topic I thought that people might like to know there’s currently a HUGE investigation into health inequalities within the black African & Caribbean communities (focused on Lewisham & Birmingham but they’re looking nationally as well) prompted by Covid-19. BLACHIR got a brief mention in BBC’s rolling news coverage on the day they talked about the wildly disproportionate number of BAME people dying from from Covid-19 & has been reported in local papers in Lewisham & Birmingham; but no more widely than that.

Am really sorry if you think it’s inappropriate - am not posting on a whim, but in hope it might reassure people there’s finally a move to look at the systemic issues impacting at least some of the BAME population.

@GrumpyHoonMain
Do you have any chance of getting referred to the Haemostasis & Thrombosis team at St Thomas’ in London? I’m on the national database as having a “miscellaneous” bleeding disorder because there’s no tickbox for me on there & have found having The Card (& backup available...) makes HUGE difference.
(Sorry if you’ve already explored this & Tried All The Other Things.)

(OP, if you don’t think this is just say & I’ll ask MNHQ to remove it. You’ve had enough people not listen & while I’m trying to be helpful I get that I might just be annoying. Sorry.)

I'm black.

Had a horrific childbirth experience as well as antenatal care while pregnant and had some very racist comments made to me by various staff which made me question their professionalism.

PALS did nothing and whitewashed everything in their investigation.

I had a lovely midwife (who was actually in charge of the midwives or head of her department, not sure of her exact title but she was due to retire and was a white lady who stayed on until I was ready to give birth and my son was a few weeks old), she advocated on my behalf and was even threatened with the sack if she continued to make waves.

It was a tough time.

Sorry you went through that.

I really wish there was something we could do to change all this.