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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to not want a television in my hospital ward?

94 replies

carlajean · 29/05/2014 17:31

just thought I'd throw this one in and see what others think..
I was in hospital to have my appendix out a week ago. I was really pleased with the care, but there was a tv in the four-bed ward. One of the other patients liked having it on all the time, as background, but I hate having tv on unless I'm watching it. So, Jeremy Kyle was on when I was waiting to go into surgery, and feeling too poorly to object.
When I came out, I said to the other woman that perhaps we could have the tv off for a couple of hours, alternating with having it on for the same period of time. I wasn't feeling brilliant about doing it, and she was quite stroppy.
I know that I could have asked a nurse to turn it off, but wanted to be on good terms with the other patients in the ward.
I feel that patients shouldn't be under pressure to have to negotiate this with each other (one of the other patients was an older woman who said afterwards to me that she didn't want the TV on but didn't feel she could object) AIBU?

OP posts:
arethereanyleftatall · 29/05/2014 17:38

Come on nhs. Everyone should be entitled to their own private room. Sarcasm. Yabu.

expatinscotland · 29/05/2014 17:40

Earplugs. YABU.

EasyWhiteChocolate · 29/05/2014 17:40

YABU. It's a hospital not a hotel. You're lucky that an annoying TV was the only thing that you had to put up with.

EhricLovesTheBhrothers · 29/05/2014 17:40

YABU, you could have ignored it.

magpiegin · 29/05/2014 17:43

It's a tough one. I would want the TV on to distract me from the boredom of hospital (and having one in the room means I wouldn't have to pay for one of those individual tvs they have in some hospitals).

ToysRLuv · 29/05/2014 17:43

Wow, I would say YANBU.

DioneTheDiabolist · 29/05/2014 17:43

I guess since the lady you asked was a hospital in-patient, she was feeling a bit poorly herself. YABU OP.

Pobblewhohasnotoes · 29/05/2014 17:44

Yabu.

If it was loud you could have asked the nurses to turn it down but the TV is a great distraction for most people in hospital.

Try working on a children's ward, it's 20 kinds of cbeebies.

GreenShadow · 29/05/2014 17:44

You horrible lot ! OP is NBU.

Of course everyone else in the ward shouldn't have to listen to one person's choice of TV channel. When DMIL was in hospital last year it was impossible to have the TVs on speaker - you could only listen through a headset.

LittleprincessinGOLDrocks · 29/05/2014 17:45

It is rare to find a ward that doesn't have individual TVs at each bed side, all with head phones so as not to disrupt others.
I spend more time in hospital than I would like to, and am about to be an inpatient for about 2 weeks. I want access to a TV as being in hospital is mind numbingly dull.
I would like to see the cost of those patient side TVs reduced though, my 2 week stay will be pricey!
YABU by the way. As long as it was switched off at a reasonable hour of the evening I can't see the issue really. If it bothered you that much you could have got earplugs brought in.

Billygoats · 29/05/2014 17:46

I would say YABU . I really wanted to watch tv when I was in hospital but I was so expensive. I'd count it as a luxury to get a tv for free.

Sneezecakesmum · 29/05/2014 17:46

To hell with the other patients. You will probably never meet them again so who cares what they think. I would have asked the nurse to turn it off. Jeremy vile is the pits!

VenusDeWillendorf · 29/05/2014 17:47

Maybe a compromise would be to have to sound down?

Some people actually have to see Jeremy!

Did you have curtains? Could you have pulled them round your bed to block the TV. Did you have an iPod / mp3?

Maybe they have the TVs on as a kind of hypnotiser, to stop the inmates uprising about the bad food/ lack of nurses on the wards.

The poor nurses are now too busy filling in forms to talk to the patients.

In a way you're lucky they ban smoking now on the wards, it could have been a lot worse!

Hope you're healing up nicely - did they give you an old style "Madeline" scar, or did they do it laparoscopically?

AuntieMaggie · 29/05/2014 17:47

YANBU when I was on HDU after major surgery the bloke in the bed opposite had a tv on constantly at a very loud volume that his relatives had bought in for him - after 8 hours of surgery and being unable to even lift my head I wasn't impressed!

maras2 · 29/05/2014 17:48

You were in hospital long enough to moan about a telly? I thought that you were chucked out as soon as you could pee.

googoodolly · 29/05/2014 17:49

YABU. Get some earplugs!

Name7 · 29/05/2014 17:49

No, I completely agree. I hate tv as background and cannot relax when it's on. When I was hospitalised a week before I gave birth with complications I was unable to nap during the day as it was constantly on. I was monitored constantly throughout the night with painful contractions so was utterly exhausted once I had my baby. I asked for it to be switched off but one of the other patients refused.

I went to a different hospital to have my gall bladder out, they had the individual TVs by the bed which you paid for plus a day lounge with a tv. It was so much better!

It is so difficult to rest in hospital and anything that can be done to help is beneficial in my opinion.

Name7 · 29/05/2014 17:50

And by the way ear plugs did not work for me.

Original poster
carlajean · 29/05/2014 17:50

I've got both venus. they did a laporoscopy, then had to open me up old-style, as it was gangrenous. Thank goodness for living in the 20th century.

OP posts:
whois · 29/05/2014 17:52

I don't think YABU at all.

I was in hospital as a child, ward of 8, TV always on. There was a football match and a big group of Dads watching it and shouting and being very loud. Not conducive to rest.

There should be individual TV, or everyone should compromise and have some time on and some time off. It's not fair that only the person that wants it on gets their way.

Xmasbaby11 · 29/05/2014 17:53

Yanbu. It would distract or calm many patients, including myself, but I think many others would find it annoying.

HauntedNoddyCar · 29/05/2014 17:54

We had a communal telly in my special care ward and it was bloody awful. TWS, JK, OBEM all at a thousand decibels. And me trying and failing to feed my baby on a 3 hourly schedule. Felt like some specialist sensory torture.

YANBU. I listened to R4 on headphones

gertiegusset · 29/05/2014 17:55

Not U, my elderly Mum was in hospital having had a stroke, she couldn't stand the bloody telly being on all the time.
Earplugs didn't help and the volume was atrocious.
Hardly conducive to getting better.

I get that others want it on but there should be limits, especially at night.

Maybe the people who want to watch it should wear the headphones.

OldVikingDudeHidMyTubeSocks · 29/05/2014 17:56

oh it sucks doesn't it.

We had those individual TV's and the lady next to me liked listening to football as she went to sleep but couldn't use headphones because they hurts her ears.

I had earplugs but they just didn't work, I think being in so much pain probably made me more sensitive to the noise.

She was a lovely lady though so I just called the nurse over to turn it off once she was asleep.

Not sure what i'd do in your situation though, a quiet word with one of the nurses maybe?

ToysRLuv · 29/05/2014 17:57

If my birth ward had had a communal telly on non-stop, I would have been suicidal. I was in a world of pain with my wound and had the beginnings of horrible, near psychotic PND.

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