To report this nurse?

[TheDonOfWinterville]

Went to visit elderly relative in hospital this afternoon and on the same ward another elderly lady was in bed. She rang her buzzer and I heard one of the care assistants say to a colleague "ignore it, she's been doing it all day, attention seeking" 😳 So the buzzer was ringing for another 10 minutes or so. Eventually the care assistant came and snapped "what do you want this time becAuse we're busy". The lady replied that she needed to make a call but couldn't reach her phone so the caret passed her her phone and walked out. A while later the lady pressed her buzzer again and a nurse came in and said "is it important because we're very busy" 😲 The lady said something about wanting her socks putting on which the nurse begrudgingly did for her. Just before we left the lady pressed her buzzer and the first carer came charging back in, turned off the buzzer, snapped "sorry, we're busy now" and walked out!!!!
So anyway as I left I spoke to the qualified nurse and said I felt the lady had been treated unfairly and it worries me that my relative may be reluctant to ask for her if this is the way patients are treated so the nurse sAid "I'm sorry but when you have buzzers going off in every room, the phone ringing and patients in genuine need of assistance it does get irritating when someone presses their buzzer every 5 minutes just to ask you to pick up bits of tissue or tell you that their coffee is cold. " she went on to hand me a pals leaflet and told me to complain about the lack of staff!! Aibu to actually complain about the staff that WERE on duty?

Sorry, not you, the OP

a little kindness from nursing staff is not too much to expect I'm sorry but that makes my blood boil. These nurses obviously could have spent the same amount of time being kind as the amount of time they spent being twats so being busy doesn't come into it

Try getting up at 4am, working a 13 hour shift with no break, being overworked and stressed and not seeing your family. Then see how easy it is for you to be kind.

I don't care what your working conditions are - it's still not ok to be cruel or rude to patients!! What worries me most is not the original post of the dismissive HCA but the continued justification of such behaviour.

I had a major operation at 21. When I woke up in a lot of pain on the ward I couldn't press the alarm button because it had been moved as far as possible out of the way I was calling for help but was ignored .one of the other patients had to go for help. A senior nurse turned up and ripped into the nurses. It didn't improve the subsequent care and I ended up with a bad infection because I had to try to try to get myself to loo and back with a loose dressing which kept falling on floor which they tutted when they had to replace I stopped asking. I was young ill and vulnerable with no family close by and those bitches never showed me one iota of human decency. I don't subscribe to the Florence nightingale crap. I've seen a lot of arrogant lazy nurses in the years since that time including one who refused to give the strong painkillers prescribed by the consultant to my brother after a car crash because he didn't agree with the decision and others who wouldn't teach me how to moisten my mothers mouth after a stroke even though thy were too busy sitting on the nurses station chatting and laughing to do it, certainly not overworked. And as the op says that's when the families are around,you go home with a sick feeling because you wonder what happens when you go home, if these people brazenly neglect your loved ones when you're there! But you're too afraid to make a fuss in case youre loved one are penalised. Everyone seems to subscribe to this underpaid saint idea re nurses In reality it's one of the few degrees where you don't pay student fees and the pay when you specialise is very good plus a public sector pension and nobody seems to hold you accountable for poor customer service. We aren't beggars on the NHS most of us pay our taxes yet we are treated as such. Most of us can cope with the receptionist who is unpleasant but when we are at our most vulnerable there are too many caregivers in the NHS who are getting away with appalling standards of care

Oh and I regularly work through the night and don't see my family for up to three four days at a time, work on different time zones and serve the public. ITS NO EXCUSE

Yanbu op. No excuse for rudeness. Yes some patients are buzzer happy but most are either lonely, anxious or frightened about what the future holds for them. Occasionally one will do it just because they are demanding in general. Staffing levels are shite on most wards, patients pick up on this and it that doesn't help them feel safe or secure. But there is no need to speak like that to them. I would complain about lack of staff and rudeness if it were me.

toonix, as someone who has suffered similar personally and who is grappling with it for another family member right now, I sympathise with you. All it takes is Ines bad encounter and your care is compromised. You feel so vulnerable and unsure about the people supposedly caring for you. Trust is gone which hampers recovery.
And you are afraid to raise it because you are intimidated by the atmosphere it creates.
A sense of proportion or balance or reasonableness flies out the window when you are vulnerable. No one chooses to be in hospital.

one bad encounter, that is.

There are some bad eggs in the profession. However most nurses and HCA do their very best. They are not martyrs yet will often work 12 hour shifts with no breaks. The elderly population imo is a concern for society as a whole not just a few NHS staff. People should do more for their own elderly / relatives.
Op if you were next this elderly patient and you know the staff were busy, why not help the lady pull her socks up?
Unfortunately as a nurse or HCA being treated like a maid for a 13 hour shift can make some people snap.
We need to support our NHS staff, we have already scoured the globe looking for people to work in these conditions. Why not improve working conditions?

With a national shortage of registered nurses things like this will happen. Nurses are paid very little and often work extra hours unpaid without breaks.

I love being a nurse, but after only 6 years I suffered burnout from doing 50 hours a week not all paid. On a daily basis I looked after end of life patients some as young as 20. I had no emotional support of any support. I'm back nursing again and loving it. But I still come home and cry that I couldn't give more to my patients or didn't have the best resources.

So yep we do get snappy. It's a reason and not an excuse.

"It's a reason and not an excuse."

Thank you for acknowledging** that.

I work in an extremely busy acute assessment unit in one of the biggest hospitals in the U.K.
The last few months have been awful and have had me questioning my career choice. On 3 occasion this week I have gone home in tears because I feel I'm failing. I had patients yesterday who I couldn't even go and wash because there were another 3 patients with dementia who had come in because their families could no longer cope and they were wandering, falling, intimidating other patients. Pooing on the floor etc. 3 of these big men who I had to try and calm down as well as my other 7 patients who needed meds transfusions etc. Then pressure from management to get patients moved onto wards etc. We are incredibly short staffed and exhausted. I had to chaperone a doctor yesterday to tell a person they had cancer and had a woman next to him constantly buzzing because she wanted to be disconnected from her drip to go for a fag but due to mental health issues couldn't go alone and we had no one to go with her. Another patient who kept buzzing to say her bed was to high then to low. She was to hot then to cold etc. For 12 hours! It's easy to be a relative and sit there judging and yes the lady shouldn't have been spoken to like that but you have to understand that nurse and hca have probably been pushed to their absolute limits in very thankless job.

Sadly I fear the situation is only going to worsen in the future
www.rcn.org.uk/news-and-events/news/nursing-workforce-heading-for-perfect-storm
I've been a nurse for 30 years and many of my contemporaries are retiring or considering retiring early or in the next few years....the NHS is under such great pressure, whatever problems there are today will only increase and I fear for free care for all