To think NHS do gooders need to realise that the patient is not always right

[oggieogggie]

I've had a right few weeks of it. I'm an auxilliary nurse and my morning normally starts by taking breakfasts around the ward. Picture the scene if you will - a trolley full of cereal, bowls and milk and a pot of hot porridge.

I walk into room one = "would you like breakfast this morning?" patient (full mental capacity) says "well before all that I'd like you to fix my TV. I cant get the channel to turn over." I say "well I'll see to that after breakfast, would you like some cereal?" he says "not until my TV is fixed ... can't you just do it, it will only take a minute (so everyone else should wait until YOUR TV is functioning before they get their breakfast and you don't see that as selfish at all?) I don't say this - I remain professional.

Imagine a few more patients who decide that their TV/Slippers/Laptop chargers etc are more important and then the unfortunate patients who receive cold porridge as a result -

Next I take a tray of hot toast around = One patient demands "I want it buttering and cutting into thin strips." I explain that she will either have to press the buzzer for someone else to come and do it or wait until I have finished delivering toast before it gets cold. "But I want it NOW!" she demands. Ok, so it's fine that everyone else will receive cold toast? that's ok with you is it?

Imagine more of the same throughout the day

"I can't get my phone working!" = well I'm taking care of a rather ill patient at the moment, it will have to wait." "that's it!! I'm making a complaint!!"

"I want you to wash me." = "I will help you but you have to wash what you can yourself." = "why?? its what you get paid for!!!" no actually - I get paid to help people back to independence and to care for those who genuinely can't do it themselves ... " - "Ive had no sleep!! I want you to wash me! I can barely move I'm in so much pain!!" (well walking down the stairs for a fag 10 minutes ago must have been agony then eh?)

I'm sorry, but could it not be said that sometimes, just sometimes certain patients are not always right and that as staff members we should not live in fear of one of these people complaining that we're not jumping through hoops to keep them happy? And no I've never had a complaint against me - I do that nursey thing of taking the abuse and maintaining a smile. Just lately I can't quite shake the notion that the NHS (and Britain in general) is so bothered about political correctness and ultimate customer satisfaction that it's actually counter productive. Why are we all so polite??!

What girltimesthree said, exactly... My DH is losing sleep, constantly anxious, trying to rally the other consultants and finding they are too frightened to whistle-blow so are keeping their heads down. Now there is no registrar who has been appointed so he is also doing the general medical take and holding the crash bleep and staying up all night just as he did 20 years ago when he was doing a 90 hour week.
He is being accused by management of cancelling a clinic as he has to do a ward round as there is no registrar to do it.... He has been told his cancelled clinic is 'unacceptable' but won't listen to why he had to cancel it or help to come up with the solutions that my DH and other are trying to come to.

There are some incredibly concrete thinkers on this thread.

Says very slowly............ We just said we buy stuff out of our own pockets. Sometimes because a patients relatives don't bother to bring stuff in. Yes of course we should use our salary to prop up a system that we have already supported via tax and NI. Nothing wrong with THAT at all because we aren't going to leave a patient unclothed whilst we argue ideology and economics with management or some naive random on Mumsnet.

See, there you go. Won't listen.

Oh I am listening, I'm just trying to cook my dinner thats all.

Patients might be annoying you but the system is shockingly, unforgiveably wrong. You have to admit that and if you keep blaming patients for complaining you are simply shooting the messenger

No dear, you are annoying me. No-one on this thread has said that all patients annoy them, or have no right to complain about poor care.

""I want you to wash me." = "I will help you but you have to wash what you can yourself." = "why?? its what you get paid for!!!"

OP, My response to that patient (at this point in my life) would be "look, I cannot help that fact that I have 400 meds that have to be given in the next hour, a patient who is bleeding out and another that needs to be immediately prepped for theatre all at the same time you want a wash. Nor can I help the fact that management doesn't want to pay to staff the place and that I am on my own here, YOU FUCKING PSYCHO."

What is coming across here is the absolute frustration and misery many NHS staff are routinely experiencing these days. I am so sorry that you have all been put in this position. Most of us are very grateful when someone looks after us and appreciate what nurses do for us.

newjob The problem isn't that a patient needs a bedpan or their toast buttering - those things are important to them. It's not their fault that their needs aren't as important as looking after someone in a crisis. The problem is that there are simply not enough staff on the wards to give a safe or acceptable level of care. That is down to underfunding, or mismanagement of funds. It's not the nurses' or patients' fault.

Newjob what is your new job?

The other problem is a fundamental disconnect between the philosophy of nursing care and the expectations of the patient. Need it be said that in my decades of nursing, the most demanding patients are those that have the least wrong with them, are the most able to self care (washing, elimination) and have the worst behaved visitors.

My role is not the fetching of chairs for your visitors- especially when there are more than there should be? I will tell you politely where the chairs are. Unless your visitors are incapacitated, I will NOT fetch them.

Patients equate caring for with caring about and they are two very different principles; one professional and without judgement, the other less so. When you say to them " you need to wash your own face because we are aiming to rehabilitate you and self care is part of that" they hear "you think we are less important than Mr J in bed 3 who gets his face washed". No matter how you explain, with some people it does no good. I suspect that Horse would be one of these.

dystopian It sounds all so depressingly familiar.
There's so much I'd like to say, but the risk of being outed is too great. It doesn't look like it's going to get any better though. Do you think your DH will stick with it?

Agree with your last post Kudzugirl, 100%

And if people want to make pointless complaints, let them, they only make themselves look stupid. The press won't touch the dentures story anyway

Are you serious? Daily Fail?

Even if senior management don't take the written complaint seriously, it's still a waste of someones time to follow it up and respond to the complaint. Someone has to investigate it you know. Not to mention the stress on the staff of having a complaint made against them. Low morale and all that

And if care staff aren't doing their jobs properly and not supplying clothing, don't use their services or charge them for new clothes for the patients. But don't ignore deal with it yourselves out of your own pockets

You see, this is where you lose all credibility horse

Looking forward to going to hospital when I'm old

This thread shows that some people have absolutely no idea what it is is like to work as a nurse yet they think they know how to do it better.

We have complained.
We have petitioned.
We have begged.

We have always been stretched doctor wise. Nursing staffing ratios were historically better but are now a problem. Sadly most of the senior nurses are now middle managers and just discuss bed status all day long round a table. What has changed mainly is patient behaviour and relatives behaviour.. They have read the Daily Fail and now they want to complain if some small thing is not sorted straight away. All perspective and understanding has gone if the frontline clinicians who are killing themselves to save lives.

Should add nurses also saving lives .

They have read the Daily Fail and now they want to complain if some small thing is not sorted straight away

This, and claim nation. A massive amount of the NHS budget goes towards court settlements. Of course if the NHS is completely at fault and has been negligent, then monetary compensation is deserved but some of the claims are absolutely ridiculous. Things that are beyond anyone's control.

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/nhs/10567114/NHS-pays-6900-compensation-for-two-bruised-toenails.html

that for example

Well we all are landrover, by then it'll be private, the system will be disorganised and fragmented. That's what makes us so angry about privatisation.. It took a lot if work to make the nhs excellent as it was , once undoneI don't think it will ever be the same standard.
Think dentists from 10 yrs ago going private to doctors now.. There will be a lot less people getting treatment and the treatment will not be well coordinated.
ATM in AE or on acute takes we see a lot of people with teeth problems as dentists no longer do out of hours and so many people do not have a dentist now.. Do you see what will happen?
Oppose Cameron and his privatisation of the nhs ... some has already been farmed out to private companies in England but he is keeping very quiet about it. By the time he is done everyone will hate the nhs anyway including it's staff who will have left because of the demolition job he is doing on it.

@ Nurseywursey

I remember filling out hundreds of incident forms over unsafe staffing when I worked in the NHS. Ignored. Yet still constantly had to listen to people say "if it's so bad why don't the nurses say something" Grrrrr.

Come to the USA. They have 4 patients on a general medical ward. Each ward has a charge nurse without a section so that she can help you if one of your patients goes downhill. She will relieve each nurse's section for 30 minutes so the nurse can have a lunchbreak. So on a 20 bed ward you have 5 nurses each one with a 4 patient assignment and a charge nurse as PRN to help out, deal with families etc. Then they have 4 health care assistants. In addition there are 4 support workers to clean rooms, fetch stuff. They have security (Big muscular hispanic guys) on standby at all times. If families start, they are out on their asses. Nurse just needs to say the word. They have tazers. The worst patients, most demanding patients are the lower income ones getting free care. We don't know why that is. They get the same level as care as the ones with insurance.

Pharmacy is 24 hours and if the pharmacists don't have an IV antibiotic mixed and ready to hang within seconds of when you need it (or any other med) they get their asses handed to them BIG TIME. Day or night. No abandoning patients to go running around wards searching and begging for meds only to have patients and families freaking out because they are not getting their stuff on time.

Once (in the NHS) I had a patient have a massive seizure, I had to push diazepam IV and I couldn't leave her to chase down another patient's parkinsons med. Duh. Parkinson's patient daughter follows me into first patients room, the one who is seizing, sees her seizing and turning blue asks me if I am not smart enough to understand that parkinsons meds need to be given on time. I should have kicked her in the vag. Dumb, crazy bitch.

Too much PTSD from the NHS to go back into it, even over here in the States anything more than PRN. Love the money though. Over here if you pick up an extra shift every week for a month you get a check for 2,000 on top of your regular pay the next pay period. And the hospital (your employer) pays for your and your families health care insurance and bills. Cheaper than working for nothing and paying out massive amounts of NI in the NHS

yeah you don't want it to go all private. Private is actually pretty shit as is the NHS. You want to have non profits. The best hospitals in the USA are the non for profits, that care for everyone who comes through the door regardless of ability to pay.

Don't see why they are remunerating.. Management stupidity. They won't pay for an extra dr to do some of thus extra stuff horse is suggesting or even pay their current Drs properly and treat them well , yet they give money away ... Thick as two short planks with too much power

I've often thought of going working abroad, that sounds like heaven newjob

they care for everyone who comes through the door and then they get the bill paid through charities, government programs or they absorb the cost.

And if care staff aren't doing their jobs properly and not supplying clothing, don't use their services or charge them for new clothes for the patients. But don't ignore deal with it yourselves out of your own pockets.

Here's what I said, but I omitted the word 'or' - don't ignore or deal with it yourselves. Of course nurses shouldn't be doing this out of their own pockets. That's ludicrous and what you might do in a war-torn country or where there's a national crisis, but not in everyday 2014 UK.

It's fairly clear what I've said throughout this thread - if NHS Staff don't sort this out, patients certainly can't. We are entirely dependent on you so quit complaining about patients because it's NOT OUR FAULT. Be professional and ignore the worst ones but focus your anger on management. Don't duck your heads in the sand, you need to blow the whistle a lot lot more to make changes.

You need to take serious action as a group now as things will only get worse when the new system starts.

Horse to water

Are you for real because you are now coming over as very passive aggressive upsetting everyone for no reason

You want this stuff to happen, get on your bike and go and do something about it yourself then come back and tell us:)