To be really pissed off at these gossiping Nurses!

[Rhymerocket]

I am a nurse! I'm on maternity leave.

I'm at a hospital appointment with my father. His appointment was for 09:10 and he hasn't been seen yet. The two nurses in the clinic are standing in the reception gossiping and joking with the receptionist. Now I know the clinic can only move as fast as the doctor but FFS. They look soooo unprofessional. I'm embareased for them. It doesn't inspire confidence in the system.

That's it Babies, my dad still hasn't even had his no done by nurse yet and they are discussing the presents Santa is bringing their kids! Still not seen 50 mins late now.

I spent 5 hrs in A&E a couple of months ago (suspected pericarditis) and the nurses were appallingly behaved. They were actually shouting across the waiting area (and in the large 'cubicles bit') and hooting with laughter about their own private stuff, nothing to do with the job in hand. One actually waltzed across in front of us carrying a large pair of ice skates!! (don't ask - no idea!) They were swigging bottles of Coke, munching on baguettes, clustered in front of the computer screens giggling. It was ghastly.

I've done temp. auxiliary nursing at the old Edinburgh Royal Infirmary while a student (early sixties) and my God, Matron would have spontaneously combusted.

I hate it when the consultant swans in at 10am (I've been waiting to see him since before 9am) and then he 'settles' himself in and I'm eventually seen at 10.30am.

That's it! I remember night sister going ballistic when she caught my colleague and I walking to the vending machine with out coats over our uniforms! Would love to see what she makes of this crowd.

Fuck me then nursing a changed since I left in the early 90s. We were far far too busy to stop let alone gossip.

Been in casualty loads recently with elderly parents and Again the staff were far too busy for messing around.

Out patients is probably a different tempo. Never done that myself. Agree op if you are waiting that would be annoying.

Hah! Regarding Outpatients Appointments, I reckon everybody gets 9am for theirs (all fifty of them!) and they start wading through them at about 10am. You can be there until 1pm. I take sandwiches, a flask of tea and my knitting.

Omg I remember our sister tutors! Frankly bloody frightening. Old school but bloody good. None of this no lifting nonsense or patients being left thirsty or dirty. God help you.

Mind you my back is fucked!

Hope you get seen soon op.

"I hate it when the consultant swans in at 10am (I've been waiting to see him since before 9am) and then he 'settles' himself in and I'm eventually seen at 10.30am"

Totally agree. I remember rushing out of work once to get to an appointment with a consultant on time. I was told by his receptionist that he wasn't back from lunch yet and when he gets back he always likes to tidy up his desk and sort out his pens so could I go downstairs to the café for about half an hour and come back. Never seemed to occur to her that I had to get back to work, or that I was actually the one paying this guy.

oh yay, it's been a while since a nurse bashing thread...too posh to wash, bring back matron, scrap this university nonsense...any other worn out old cliche I've forgotten? Yawn...

Happy. I was like you. And still am to an extent. I work in a busy ICU so I don't get time to go for a piss most days but these two wee girls are seriously taking the piss.

Now I know the clinic can only move as fast as the doctor

So what are they supposed to do?

Gimme a break Ringo, I've been qualified since 1993 and am appalled at some of the HCAs that have passed their interviews and been accepted for nursing

I don't know. I'm an ex HCA. We'd find that we'd be up at 6am to get to work for 7am. From that point on we rarely got a chance to pee let alone speak to any other staff. Everybody had to be fed, sat up, taken to the toilet, washed and dressed, beds changed and it took all morning and you had to work bloody hard to get it done. We very often didn't get a break at all - so nothing to drink or eat in around 5 or 6 hours in a hot, sweaty environment doing physically hard work.

Then after lunch the visitors would come. That gave us 5 or 10 minutes to actually speak to one another, stand still. I think they all assumed we'd been stood like that all day. It was just the lull before the next storm.

I find this every time I go for a maternity appointment, they tend to be moaning about working conditions and how short staffed they are, which I fully believe is the case, but it doesn't look great having 5 nurses standing moaning about how much work they have to do for half an hour and making no attempt to hide the discussion from patients rather than actually doing the work.

I'm a lowly care worker and if we behaved like that we'd be getting the sack and the rope to tie it with.

I must admit however, on a recent tip to see MIL in hospital I was very impressed by the professionalism of the nurses. They were obviously very stretched staff wise but remained calm and on top of everything

Ringo qualified 1985. Staff nurse/ward sister and then district nurse.

Agency ever since.

Worked with some seriously crap nurses and some fantastic ones.

However the training and ethos of the 1970s/80s is very different to today's training.

Ringo I've been in hospital twice in recent years. The first time in a modern hospital with young nurses who had graduated from University.
The second time in a more old fashioned hospital where most of the nurses were middle aged and had trained on the ward under the strict eyes of a matron.
There really was no comparison in the level of care I received. My first experience was horrible. The nurses really didn't seem to have any instincts at all and expected everything to be done according to the text book (when I vomited one of the nurses said to me 'why is it so black'? in a confused, bewildered voice. HTF was I supposed to know??).
My second experience was lovely. The nurses were calm, reassuring and made the patients feel they were in safe hands and being well looked after.

There are valid reasons for wondering if some elements of the old style training should be re-introduced.

It wouldn't matter if these nurses were actually beating the shit out of someone and doing strip jagerbombs at the nurses station.

Someone would still come along and cry "nurse bashing".

And to add as I previously stated the recent care of my dm was faultless after surgery. Kind and wonderful.

Chatting with work mates and having a good working relationship is one thing, gossiping is another. Also if they know some people are waiting over the time they should be, it's only manners to look like you aren't swanning about doing nothing (even if you are because you are waiting on someone else!)

This reminds me of the week I had to go for my GTT appointment at the hospital (so was sat around people watching for a good few hours!) It was the same week as the nurse/midwife strike.

I was sat in the main waiting area of the building (each department has it's own reception desk) where 2 women were sat at a table, with a phone plugged into the wall that never rang. Both had a brew with them and both spent the next 3 hours sat infront of the signs asking people if they knew where they were going (to which everyone said yes due to the big signs with arrows on!) They chatted about their shopping, kids, food, every person who walked past they had a snide comment about, and she picked up the phone twice to ring a department about her uniform not fitting very well, but it did last year, can someone not take it in or change it for her.

They did nothing... all the while nurses and midwifes were on strike about pay...

Glad I had somewhere to rant about this now!

I remember being bawled out for allowing the soap to stay in the water during a bed bath And not using the soap dish as that was sloppy!

Your patient got a pressure sore! You were in trouble.

It is different today. Very different as are all professions. Look at teaching!

I want to work in out patients!