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 hospital staff put up with is beyond ridiculous. Low pay, long hours, abuse and ingratitude. I was being treated in hospital by lovely staff as I heard nurses in the corridor being abused by a drunk. They laughed as I managed to say if I was well I'd sort him out. I would have. The police removed him. Thank you for everything you do and ignore the silly people on here.

It is pretty good. We get the occasional problems. The floor I occasionally go to had a patient who was giving them a hard time recently. Young guy.

He had kidney failure secondary to diabetic noncompliance and drug abuse. He is unemployed on disability and getting all free care, nice private room with a TV and full bathroom, room service etc. He had a tessio line inserted for dialysis and when he went home he shot crack up into the dialysis line and it got infected and stuff. Had to come back in. Then he was at the nurse's station flipping out and yelling because his private room wasn't big enough to have his friends stay over. What the nurse was supposed to do about that I don't know. He didn't like the room service because the doctor had ordered him a diabetic renal diet and he wanted soda and ice cream etc etc. Nurse hits security button, they arrive 10 seconds later and he went back to his room LOL.

Having a security presence really helps because a lot of these people are picking on your because you are a woman. They see a 6 ft 5 security guard with a tazer on his belt coming their way and they stop with the crap and stupid service demands almost immediately. I've seen the security guards get a family member on the floor and hold him down. He was really, really nuts though. They tazed a detoxing patient for going after an HCA with a drip stand which he put through a wall. Good times.

I should have kicked her in the vag. Dumb, crazy bitch. So you're still a nurse then Newjob. Just wow.

horsetowater

You keep saying 'you need to do this.. you need to do that'

We have.

Why won't you listen horse when posters who work in hospitals have explained many times? Why don't you contact your MP or senior management at your hospital?

@Horse

I hope to god your nurse isn't dealing with a relative like that when you are turning blue because your airway is obstructed. Seriously, visitors like that need to be commited to psych.

Yes another thing that annoys me is patients who have self inflicted illness. Why should somebody else be responsible? It's not as if there isn't enough genuine cases?

Is anyone else wetting themselves with excitement?

horse, you are a genious!

Thanks for that wonderful advice.

In the meantime, DFOD

and Horse, I talk like I do because I am an American. I'm not actually going to kick anyone in the vag. It is an expression thrown around quite liberally on here as is this "you are crazy and need to be punched in the face".

Seriously Horse, take some lithium and level out a bit, hun.

genius

over here not on here.

genius

Oops posted twice.

You see horse, what you don't know is that the management are the enemy. They have their agenda and it opposes the clinicians agenda. They have got more power now and govt don't champion us, they are on the side of the management .
In addition, we work max hours and do the life saving part so don't have any time to have coffee with themanagers and thrash through this stuff .
If youwant us to fetch chairs, do a bitof carpentry and chat to management, hey that sounds cool ... Just you won't forget some medical locums in to cover us though while we swan iff will you? ;)

@ brakeover. Awesome. Well said and true.

We do complain and we fill in incident forms for poor and unsafe staffing. Had to do a few this week alone. But if you do whistleblow you better be prepared to have your work scrutinised to the nth degree. Make sure you have dotted all your i's and crossed your t's because they will hound you out.
We are so rushed and staffing is so thin at times that its easy to miss documenting something. It could be something simple like being late giving a medication because you were with a really sick patient.. Thats what they will get you on, they wont give a crap why the medicine was late, they will just use it against you.
Just look at the cases on the NMC website for what they are sanctioning nurses over and also our code of conduct. they have us over a barrel. Our code says we must make seniors aware of unsafe situations. We do and they tell us to get on with it, theres nothing they can do. Then when something does go wrong they turn round and ask us why we ignored our code and worked under those conditions...

to get some medical locums in while we swan off ( shouldn't be a problem ) ;)

You just aren't reading what people are posting, are you horse? Never mind, carry on banging your drum and blaming the staff. However, don't be at all surprised in the future when you need care that there are even fewer nurses left to look after you. As has already been posted, medical and nursing staff are leaving in droves because it's impossible to give the care people deserve.
My friend is a nurse tutor. A few years ago a third of her colleagues lost their jobs because they were cutting the number of nurses they were training. Five years later they have had to double the number of students they take in because they've found that the average career of a nurse is around five years. Around a third of the students in my friend's current cohort are planning on emigrating as soon as they can post qualifying.
Now, I don't see that as a nurse's problem - it's a problem for all of us - we are paying to train these people. We can't afford to lose them so soon after that kind of investment.

Well said brakeover. Everything you've said..

I actually hope some journo is reading this and writes something.

Well if they think the ' just shagging' thread is a seedy underbelly of mumsnet God knows how their brains work

The journos are not interested.

If they were, it would be twisted into what nasty bitches we are.

I've had one family who refused to stay on the ward because their side room was too small. Yes that's right, too small. They were lucky to have a flipping side room!

There was another time when a child arrested, full on cardiac arrest, and a parent stopped me to ask for some paracetamol.

Another parent who kicked off because he thought they were entitled to a side room (infectious patients get side rooms as priority), because he pays his taxes.

It just goes on and on and on. People just don't realise that they aren't your only patient. I think that's why they can't understand why you aren't immediately fixing the TV or fetching a chair or changing the TV channel. It's not that we don't care, it's just we have 100 other things to do that are higher up the priority list.

We had a patient and her daughter shout at the staff to take her out for a fag in her wheelchair. Although we are not allowed, rather than telling them to pack it in, management told us to take her.

Lovely that was. Abuse all the way there, standing in a puff of smoke listening to snide comments, then all the way back.

It got so bad, she started to demand to come on our breaks with us

That was a step too far and we point blank refused.

Is that unreasonable of us horse?

Nursing on the front line today is hell . Absolute hell.
I am old for a mumsnetter and qualified in 1976 so have seen all the changes over time .
For sure it wasnt wonderful in the 70s but there was adequate staff ratio and the nursing was not so acute ie some of the ward were near to discharge and needed less specialised care . I adored my work . And enjoyed learning from newer graduate nurses and adapted and learned . My wisdom was passed on.

The NHS has been eroded so much over the last 30 odd years with each successive govt . So many changes in management structure it made my head spin while keeping up with my nursing . No time ever given to the nurses voice.
One of my extra jobs was to do the ordering [as many nurses will know]. We needed office desks . I could have been given a half day and gone to IKEA and got them for a quarter of the price in the catalogue . Waste waste ..but dont dare order dressings that will help a particular patient .

I got ill in the end and left two years ago . Arrive for work at 8 and never left before 7 at night [5.30 finish] ..then commute . No break beyond 25 minutes .
My mental health is in tatters .

Oh yes I dread being in hospital now. But my god it isnt the nurses doing .