...to be proud to work as a HCP?

[PacificDogwood]

Not a thread about a thread. Although quite obviously inspired by one.

I am not British.
I trained on mainland Europe.
I have worked for the NHS for 18 years.

I think it is a phantastic system and I hope the current political climate will not destroy it or turn it into a shadow of itself.

HCP are people. As are patients.
Both are fallible.
They have off days.
They make mistakes.

There is no excuse for incompetence, but no matter how brilliant a HCP, mistakes will happen. It is terrible when they do, but happen they will.

Life is a lethal condition which will end in death.
In the meantime I try to listen, help where I can (often I cannot), investigate and reassure.

My only contact with the NHS as a patient has been in the context of pregnancy/MC/delivery (ok, and SCBU for DS2).
I am lucky to have had good experiences and, in the end, good outcomes.

Please cheer me up by some Good News stories.
Negative generalisations depress me.

Everything that's what we live for. Though possibly not the kisses.

My general feeling of well being may also be inversely related to the level of in the bottle next to me, mind

When I had DD1 by emergeny c section, the midwives, doctors, assistants and nurses were amazing. They were all incredibly kind and I had a private room in our local NHS hospital. They fussed and checked and made me laugh.

Even the porters were ace. I tell everyone how great it was and how they turned a traumatic birth into a load of special memories. thanks to thm DD was fine and so was I.

Thanks to all HCPs.

Some days I love my job feel like am making a difference to people, however small it may be, other days are so :(

oh yes. all those people on the end of the phone I ring and wail to when I can't do something IT/Sdmin?appointment/referral-ish.

Pacific, I have to say, in all my years, pregnancies, MCs, illnesses etc, all the medical professional I have ever dealt with have been nothing but lovely, gentle, reassuring, helpful & professional & more often than not - pretty funny,(other than one after hours doc I saw once when I had mastitis - but let us not speak of him - nobber).

I salute & thank you all.

When I read horror stories they are completely at odds to my experience of the NHS, I accept they happen but I rarely read articles about how fucking great they actually are, I have been treated for the usual stuff, broken bones, wisdom teeth, babies, dead babies & even an idiotic drunken head injury (many years ago) & every time I have been amazed at their patience, humour & humanity.

And, AND, have been more amazed recently when my father was quite ill, his friend (who is admittedly, head of surgery at a large teaching hospital), advised the best surgeon for his problem, he was able to get a referral from his GP & was operated on within weeks, but the referral was nothing to do with his friend - my father merely asked to be referred to that surgeon, was referred & seen promptly due to the severity of his condition.

I have NO complaints. In fact I'm humbled that we are so lucky to have a free at point service like the NHS.

My god. That other thread is horrific. how dare these people slag off a fantastic, free, easily accessed healthcare system that 3/4 if this planet would just about die to be able to have (I am aware of the irony of this statement!)

All the HCPs I have come across - thankfully not many - have been fantastic. Even the surly sonographers . I posted this on a thread a couple of weeks ago that cervix started about mw's - that I am truly blessed to have had the care of the mw's I had in my recent pregnancy, and they (one especially) saved DD's life as my placenta was abrupting. I didn't know that I was in so much pain in labour because of this, indeed I didn't even know it could happen. The mw on the phone made me come into hospital a lot earlier than I would have gone (having no frame of reference I thought the unbelievable amount of pain and non-stop contracting was normal). The paediatrician and consultant who had me in surgery within 15 mins of arriving at hospital and the team who resuscitated DD, along with the mw who called them all have my undying thanks.
As have the team of consultants and nurses who gave us DD through fertility treatment.
And the GPs who referred me to the reproductive medicine unit.
And the A&E doctor who saved my little brother's life when he presented with very atypical meningitis symptoms.
And the huge team of carers who worked with my nana after her multiple strokes, meaning she never had to go into a home and died in her own bed.
I couldn't do your jobs (and I think of myself as a very resilient, caring, straight person).
The people on that other thread need to wake up and smell some coffee.

i have had the best healthcare money can buy - i means one of my doctors edited part of Greys Anatomy (the text book, not TV program) but i have also used the NHS & i think it is absolutely amazing & the staff i have met are heros!

fell off my bike quite badly. the paramedics were extremeley professional (& gave me good bike tips) & treated me like a grown up.

yes, yes, yes

the majority of healthcare in this country, whichever form it takes, frontline or support, is marvellous

the naysayers have no idea what it would be like without this system, because they have never known anything different

it is flawed, there are cockups, yes we accept it

but where would we be without the NHS ?

let's make this thread longer than the other one, eh ?

Yes - let's AF

I can do stories

I am proud to work in NHS support services. Whilst not being frontline, without these services the NHS would grind to a halt, I make no apology for what I do.

YANBU to be proud, trained HCP who now works in non-clinical post here and I do miss it (I don't miss the chronic understaffing and lack of resources in clinical areas though).

The NHS is a wonderful institution and I hope that one day we'll have a government who realise internal markets really don't seem to do it any good. There will never be enough money in the pot but the profiteering should stop. I don't know how drug companies, PFI racketeers and those twats who invented "bedside tv and phones" can sleep at night for starters!

oh god yeah...bedside tv

wtf was that all about ?

where I work, it is always broken anyway

that is the kind of thing that gives the NHS a bad name, not the staff that work within it

Thank you to the nurses who brushed me teeth for me in ITU a month ago, who washed my face, gave me a bed pan and talked to me.

:)

Oh yes and thank you to the porter who had done years in the fire service and volunteers as a trainer for the St Johns Ambulance who realised how ill I was on our way down to xray and got me emergency oxygen when no-one else had noticed.

Thank you to the surgeon who hoovered out my lung and made sure I had the emergency surgery I needed to make sure I didn't get really really ill.

:)

Fuck me you mean there is another thread knocking HCP's.

I haven't read it.

Oh and just to agree with the funding - my DS' Cons Pead prescibed him epi-pens after he had an array of allergic reactions eneding in a severe one with swollen face/lips and inreased breathing pattern. They have been prescribed 'just-in-case' on history (many negative RASTS). No-one said wait until he has a true life threatening reaction they have said he may so have the medication to deal with it.

thread from earlier

Funnily enough because I was being nice about something , not many replies .

OP glad you started this thread - I have to go into hospital soon and it was making me rather depressed!! Can only imagine how it made you as a HCP feel.

But..... as someone who has collided with the NHS recently..... it does strike me that there are some pretty big problems with the system. I wonder if that is what gets people hacked off. Not the individual people - I mean, personally, every individual doctor and nurse I've dealt with over the last few months, in and out of hospital, has been lovely and caring with only one exception. But the bigger system, which you can see they're trapped in, and which seems so wasteful.

E.g.: I had to be readmitted for emergency surgery over the summer as an operation had gone wrong. Now, this op had happened on Monday afternoon - I was readmitted about 13 hours later on Tuesday - but they had to go through and take all my details again. A very, very lovely junior doctor sat down with me and went painstakingly through all the history of the recent op, and all the questions like 'Are you diabetic?' etc.

To me, this is ridiculous: surely, surely all this info was in my notes from the day before. Also, after the junior doc saw me, I was readmitted to a urology ward - where a lovely nurse put together my urology care plan asking substantially the same questions again. This seems like such a waste, especially as there was a dying woman in the bed next to me. Surely it is not beyond the wit of man to devise a more efficient system and let HCPs actually get on with seeing patients?

Sorry that is such a rant But this is my first experience with the NHS really, and I have been struck repeatedly by the inefficiency. Sometimes, having waited nearly 2 years for the operation I need, I get kind of frustrated thinking that if only there weren't these problems, I might've got the care I needed months ago.

Spiderslegs 'We need to sack all the bastard administrators though ' - well that would be me then. I am a NHS manager. Yesterday one of my lovely patients (I work in an area with close patient contact) described me (affectionately) as their Rottweiler as I won't let go of the issues I am chasing up for them. I really didn't know where to look.
May I however keep my job as contrary to your apparent belief, effective administration is what keeps the lovely doctors and nurses able to do their jobs.

My dad has just been readmitted back to hospital for hte 4th time this year. He is a regular inpatient over the last few years, the first time three years ago he was there for 6 months.

They always get him back on the same ward and I could have cried with happiness when he was put back there from the emergency assessment unit the other day. The HCAs and the nurses were all like hello and calling him by his name saying that they knew it must be him and they'd got him his bed ready and were pleased (but not pleased iykwim) to have him back. Was such a warm welcome and it makes such a difference knowing he'll be well looked after.