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Original poster

Nurses eating on shift...

575 replies

PatsyAndEddy · 12/07/2013 20:44

Just back from hospital visiting a friend who had her tonsils out today. She had to fast from 10 pm last night and didn't get taken for her op until 2pm, that's a long time without food for anyone!

She missed dinner on the ward but they got her a sandwich but she's really sore and hungry!

On the ward her bed is right next to the nurses station. She said they were sitting munching on a large bag of kettle chips in front of her between the three of them. She commented on how she thought that was a but mean, they snapped back saying 'well we have to eat' at which point my friend reminded them that's what they're breaks were for.

I don't think she's flavour of the month in the ward! She can be a bit of a grump at the best of times but starving, sore and groggy I think she reached her limit!

We're the nurses being unreasonable, eating on shift?

OP posts:
charlieboy6 · 13/07/2013 21:00

First of all I haven't read the whole thread so sorry if I repeat what's all ready been said,but this has struck a nerve with me.
My DD is a nurse. She works 12/13+hrs. There might be x amount of staff on, but each nurse will have their own patients to look after. Obs and drugs have to be done a certain times. If she's looking after somebody, that needs her, at the time she should be on her break she can't just walk away. By the time she has finished doing whatever the patient needed she's missed her break. She can't go and take it late because she will have an endless list of other things to do,which have to be done at set times.
Or is she wrong, should she just walk off the ward to eat? Or maybe because she is a nurse she doesn't need to eat?

Delayingtactic · 13/07/2013 21:08

Gosh I'm amazed at the level if vitriol displayed here. (Most) nurses work extremely hard for relatively poor pay in difficult conditions. The problem isn't eating at the desk per se but the system failures that have meant that this is necessary. Most of the hospitals I've worked at have reallocated what used to be staff rooms into storage areas or offices which means that nurses have no where feasible to go to eat.

At my current hospital in one ward they'd either have to go to a different ward or sit in the sisters office which is in full view of visitors as they come in. This means that relatives hover asking to speak to the nurse looking after their mum/dad etc and get the hump if they don't come to the door. Or become very verbally abusive.

Paperwork has become crippling and a shocking amount if their time has to be spent documenting the minutiae of the day rather than actually delivering patient care. These things need to be focused on rather than the audacity of nurses eating.

littlemefi · 13/07/2013 21:14

Well said delayingtactic!

Plus3 · 13/07/2013 21:18

Do you know....and you might find this hard to believe..DOCTORS eat the same food at the nurses station as well !!! Who knew??

I do assume the same level of vitriol will also be directed towards them as well now.

Delayingtactic · 13/07/2013 22:01

plus3 that's the thing isn't it? I certainly have sat at the computer eating chocs or cripss and during my houseman year eating a proper dinner brought to me by very kindly nurses who took pity on me and certainly didn't have any comments. But I wonder now if people were silently judging? But as others have said its just a snapshot rather than a true understanding of why that's become commonplace.

SauvignonBlanche · 13/07/2013 22:08

I remember, in the bad old days, making strong coffee for the exhausted house officer before you would let them anywhere near patients, a casual observer wouldn't have understood my motives or actions.

susiedaisy · 13/07/2013 22:22

We regularly make the doctor food and drink which they eat in the nurses office, they get no break everyone's demanding their time and attention and they are close to either passing out or breaking down in tears some days, but to a passing patient or relative it would look entirely different to see the doctor eating food whilst in fairly close proximity to patients, to all those bitching,whinging and side swiping at frontline Nhs staff I say get a fecking grip!

bassetfeet · 13/07/2013 22:33

susie have also seen too many distraught exhausted docs/nurses break down in tears . It is awful to see a sobbing colleague and it happened far too often .

50shadesofknackered · 13/07/2013 22:33

Bloody hell! If any of them called your friend sweetheart they should have been sacked on the spot! I've just got back from work (I am a nurse) where I worked an 8 hour shift. I spent at least 4 hours of that shift desperate for the toilet but having no time to go. When I finally made it to the toilet I was moaned at by a patient when i got back, because I had kept him waiting! I wasn't more than a minute. I didn't have a break and barely had time to have a glass of water every now and then. There were two RGN's looking after 24 patients and us along with HCA's didn't stop all day! If there had been anything kettle chips available I'd have eaten them!

Darkesteyes · 13/07/2013 22:34

I think nurses do a great job and the way they looked after DH when he was in hospital after a heart attack 7 and half years ago was fucking fantastic.
Why the fucckity fuck arent the BBC doing a programme about the privatisation of the NHS rather than that benefit bashing We All pay Your Benefits which was on the other night.

expatinscotland · 13/07/2013 22:37

I used to buy coffees for the doctors and nurses, too. So often that I knew what many of them preferred and how they took it.

Darkesteyes · 13/07/2013 22:39

Am absolutely appalled at the way nurses are being treated in the workplace. Not being able to go to the toilet for hours on end (i have an overactive bladder and i WOULD end up pissing myself on the ward) and nothing to drink and not even a snack.
What a disgusting way to treat people. Thanks Thanks Thanks to all the nurses and docs on this thread and in the NHS who do such a hard job.

sagfold · 13/07/2013 22:39

Congrats expat

bassetfeet · 13/07/2013 22:40

expat .....you star .

expatinscotland · 13/07/2013 22:40

On what? My daughter died.

Alisvolatpropiis · 13/07/2013 22:41

Your friend is BU but I can imagine anybody eating food in front of her when she's hungry,grumpy and sore would have pissed her off in equal measure at the time.

expatinscotland · 13/07/2013 22:43

What's a few Kettle crisps?

People who observe Ramadan fast like that every day whilst the rest of the world eats around them. La-tee-da.

bassetfeet · 13/07/2013 22:45

Sorry expat. I didnt mean anything other than your kindness to the staff. I worked in oncology with children and would never intend to hurt you .

expatinscotland · 13/07/2013 22:48

I just never thought to be offended by someone eating when I had to fast, and having had 4 knee surgeries and various other procedures (you have to fast for many different kinds of diagnostic tests, too), I've had to go without plenty of times. So what? So no one is supposed to eat around you because they are at work?

susiedaisy · 13/07/2013 23:24

A lot of the venom towards nurses I think stems from the media, over the last few years they constantly portray staff as lazy and ignoring patients who are desperate for attention, and slowly public opinion had changed, the media do the same to doctors, the fire service, police, teachers, even farmers, IMO people need to be careful what they wish for, if the Nhs doesn't have the general publics support it will be all the easier to break it up and disband it, and eventually our grandchildren will be paying for healthcare!

wharrgarbl · 13/07/2013 23:36

RulesgirlIn Australia you have to pay for healthcare and its way expensive.

What are you talking about? Where did you hear this? Completely untrue.

Alisvolatpropiis · 13/07/2013 23:37

Having read the entire thread I must admit I am stunned at the level of vitriol towards nurses. How unpleasant.

whataboutbob · 14/07/2013 00:02

I work on a ward ( not as a nurse). Matron has made it clear that eating in view of patients is unprofessional. However many nurses don t get time for lunch till say 3 pm, so no wonder your friend isn t too popular!

WouldBeHarrietVane · 14/07/2013 07:20

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Tiredemma · 14/07/2013 07:30

Matron probably has a nice office away from the ward where she can eat her sandwiches/food.

Im a ward manager. Hell would freeze over before I would tell any member of staff that they couldn't have something to eat.

You start treating your workforce like this and before long you have staff off sick with stress and exhaustion.

I would love to say that staff get their regular breaks, and most often they do- however on occasion we are so short that its impossible to get off for a break- how anyone could then justify not letting someone eat is beyond me.

Ive had no complaints about 'unprofessionalism' from anyone about any member of my staff.

Government cuts are shafting our frontline staff left, right and centre. If a nurse is observed eating on a ward then its generally as all ready described on here- because they have no alternative. Not because they are fat, lazy, unprofessional pigs (as the DM would love us to believe).

Cut us some slack please.

I wonder if the OPs friend would have been so enraged about the nurses eating a bag of kettle chips if they had been part of a team that had saved her life- rather than aftercare for having her tonsils removed?

THe NHS as we know it will soon be eradicated- You may even be able to have your tonsils removed in Tesco's at some point in the near future. I predict that then people really will have something to complain about.