AIBU to wonder what the heck is going on in hospitals right now??

[Rinoachicken]

Before I start, I want to make it clear I am NOT blaming the hospital staff in any way.

13 hospitals have declared state of emergencies or whatever it is.

Why is everyone suddenly descending on A&E all over the country all in the same week? Has there been an outbreak of something I don't know about?

I don't get it. A&E is always stretched to the limit, but Why this sudden crisis all over the country?

Am I missing something??

Stillwishihadabs

Social services had hold of him initially, they were pushing for him to go into care and then realised they had been over zealous. This is the same hospital where a little boy with cancers family got chased across the country!

stillwish that was unnecessary. My DSIS and pretty frail DF care for my totally with it, but seriously immobile and very heavy DM.

Without the proper equipment they risk injuring themselves. Without a comped and an adjustable bed appearing very promptly, she would have had to stay in hospital recently too.

Commode

I do understand that if specialist equipment is needed that takes time (no idea if that applies here) But there is an asumption that it is someone else's responsibility to sort these things out. As a society we need to take more responsibility for our aged parents.

If one is able to act as carer or be around for older adult thats a personal choice,dependent on circumstances
Not all families are able to support older adult relatives.there are factor that make it impossible
One cannot expect or assume familes to take on care or significant role.in case were not possible family can discuss preference etc with team plannong for discharge

A huge factor is that people can't get the care they need/want else where, therefore ending up on A&E out of desperation.

I think it's fair to say that a lot of people who sit and wait in A&E are not there due to an accident nor are they in an emergency.

That's a key factor.

I think I am being misunderstood here, I totally understand that family care isn't everyone's first choice. What I am talking about is people taking responsibility eg: finding nursing homes with vacancies, care agencies, maybe taking some time off work either paid or unpaid to sort this stuff out. Rather than just assuming "they" will do it. And don't get me started on refusal to release assets to pay for care.

Time off to sort care package,how much time?not all employers offer discretionary carer leave
Not all employers are sympathetic to such requests
People should realistically have input they can manage and maintain
Who is the they? Do you mean local authority and/or nhs

Combination of things.

Firstly there's a lot of bed blocking at the minute. Elderly people who are fit to be discharged but need some form of care. So the problem starts in social services/elderly community beds.

There has also been an increase in a&e attendance, where I work this past fortnight is 22% higher than same period a year ago. Maybe to do with how xmas day fell, so no GPs for a four day stretch?

Staffing is getting worse at all hospitals and Id say a lot of this is to do with pay and conditions getting worse every year. No pay rises for three years, pension scheme a lot less attractive, plus increased pension contributions. And workload and paperwork increases with more targets, more clinical governance, hospitals jumping through CQC hoops.

Suddenly being a nurse, or a HCSW or a midwife isn't as an attractive job. You then have hospitals like Scarborough where the chief exec says they are advertising and advertising but can't recruit staff.

So less staff means there isn't the slack in the system to cope with busy periods.

Also due to worse pay and conditions the goodwill of the staff is going or gone.

My hospital are tweeting begging people to come in on days off, not take their annual leave, etc. a few years ago people would have rushed in to help. Now they're not. They've had enough. They feel unappreciated and are fed up. I've heard people say that they won't come in because they're fed up of bailing the hospital out of shit.

Three nurses walked off the wards mid shift last week which is unheard of. They said it wasn't safe and were concerned about their registration and refused to stay.

I knew this would turn into a 111 bashing thread.

We took just under 4000 calls in 2 days over Cristmas.
Of those we kept 80% out of a&e as we're we're able to make out of hours to & nurse appointments locally.
We gave simple home care advice to the majority of the remainder & advised a&e to a handful, sent a few ambulance out.

Those people would have presented at a&e if they had not used the 111 service.

Most take absolutely NO responsibility for their own health, have zero common sense and expect stretched services to cater for their every whim. (Think expecting an ambulance because their toenail fell off in the bath after walking around town doing shopping all day)
Having a sore throat for an hour DOES not need a Dr appointment, it needs paracetamol & fluids...yes, really, that's all it needs.

Frustrating does not cover it, BUT the knowledge we have eased a&e pressures feels very good.

Are you suggesting some convoluted coordinated conspiracy morebeta?given your suspicion of public sector
It would be a huge roswell type conspiracy for unrelated hospital trust to qct as a mass group
Too well timed?What are you actually inferring has gone on?

Yes I do. The thing is all sorts of things happen which you don't expect and people have to deal with it. Isnt there a statuatory right to unpaid carer's leave ? Why is it legitimised when it's a child who needs care, but not an older person ? Or what about using a bit of annual leave ?I would have thought if one gave it's one full attention you could organise it in a week or two.

I don't understand it either. Most modern countries manage to run a reasonable Health Service. Why can't the UK. Without all this fuss and people not being able to see doctors and queues and so on. I don't think that much of the NHS tbh. It's lost the plot.

There was a thread yesterday - "Yodel driver in tears" or something - where the OP's delivery man was desperately trying to finish his round while his DP was miscarrying, because he'd be sacked if he didn't.

Meanwhile bedroom tax and further cuts to housing benefit continue to force people away from their home areas.

That's how realistic it is to expect:

a) employers to give people time off to care for sick relatives

and

b) that said relatives are in the same county, never mind same town.

That is truly shocking pausing. But I am not talking about emergency time off here. My Dsis is a discharge coordinator and she says the lack of family involvement is shocking.

Out of interest, what's your own employer's policy to emergency carer's leave, Still?

How long would you get, and what would happen if you told them you're just taking two weeks off RIGHT NOW and they'll have to cope.

Or do you not have an employer and therefore don't need to worry about such things?

I don't know swooosh - I work in the community and we are absolutely run off our feet. We have had so many patients discharged too early - they end up being readmitted, usually by ambulance via A&E. It is literally a vicious circle. One of my patients is in for the 3rd time since Christmas with the same condition that has not been properly treated.

Some of these people that are discharged too soon, to empty homes with no support, are just going to die.

NHS worker it would be fine (although some would be unpaid). It's not "right now" though is it ?

Well I work for the nhs and when my dad was dying last year and there was no hospice bed so we had to care for him at home I was told that I couldn't have compassionate leave as he hadn't died yet. I had to go off sick.

And even then I got phone calls asking me if he'd died yet.

Agree 3 little frogs but to what extent is it the responsibility of the hospital to organise the support that would make the discharge safe ?

I am sorry about your Dad Viva. We are entitled to 6 days paid carers leave per year (that may be my hospital,I thought is was NHS policey) :(

Our local hospital has cancelled all elective operations for the past 2 days, bit is not appearing in the papers because these cancellations are not due to problems with a&e. We've had lots of admissions of frail elderly people, along with noro virus/ clostridium diff and some respiratory virus that's going about. The number of delayed discharges is actually pretty low, but people aren't being discharged as quickly as normal because they are more ill. And if course the restricted services over Christmas and new year haven't helped. Things are pretty shit at the minute.

Lucky you, with your employer. Most are rather less generous.

Don't know what you mean by "it's not right now".

I was assuming you meant emergency cover for a short time between leaving hospital and social care being given. In which case it is "right now" because there isn't much predictability about when someone is admitted to hospital or when they'll be discharged.

If you're talking about long term care, you'll have to leave your job anyway so leave doesn't come into it.

And if you're really unlucky, you'll take emergency leave to cover a hospital admission and then find that social care doesn't cut in for weeks because you're now a low priority - after all, your relative doesn't need the care because they have you! And you'll lose your job anyway.