About curtains on hospital wards

[Bubbinsmakesthree]

Currently on post-natal ward, baby in SCBU, recovering from c-section.

I don't mind leaving most of my dignity at the door, i don't mind partners and visitors on the ward.

But is it too much to ask to be allowed the bloody curtain around my bed to be closed?

Matronly midwife seems to have nothing better to do than insisting my curtains are open.

Excellent standard of care? The young woman in the bay opposite and I ended up providing care for the lady next to me. There was no 'care', she was sat in a chair after an EMCS away from her buzzer and baby. Despite the curtains being open, no one came when she called out in the night, tried to stand up and fell back, bleeding, whilst her baby coughed up mucus. I picked up the baby and changed the sheets in her cot whilst the other woman went to fetch someone, thankfully she and I were able to stand up.

She spent the night moaning in pain, with no one answering her buzzer. After major surgery.

The level of 'care' there was shocking to non-existent.

When I had my first a male visitor went into the patient toilet and didn't come out, which meant we couldn't use it, until finally another male visitor went to fetch someone and the man was found in there shooting up heroin. He kicked off and started tearing at the curtains and ripping them off being dragged off by security and the police, all whilst I was sat naked to the waist feeding my baby.

But it's unicorns and rainbows people want to be spared a little privacy and dignity.

Whoever is talking about different staffing requirements for single tooted units to open bays is talking tosh, I'm afraid. The actual guidance is quite vague but is issued by NICE
www.nice.org.uk/guidance/sg1/chapter/1-Recommendations#principles-for-determining-nursing-staff-requirements
It does not differentiate wards and single rooms.

I was lucky, I had a private room... but I'm guessing this was purely by chance. If I'd been on a ward I think I would've discharged myself early - sounds horrendous.

There would be an expectation of higher staffing for higher dependency patients - ITU, recovery, tend to have 121 or even 221 but may be 122.
Maternity guidance is 121 in active labour with supernumerary labour ward co-ordinator. Outside that guidance was 1 RN to 6 patients but that guidance is now obsolete. Trusts should have a dependency based staffing tool that is used to determine safe staffing.

No, it's unicorns and rainbows to want a standard of care that simply isn't possible for what we currently put into the NHS. If you want the same standards as France or Germany, you'd have to bring health insurance into it.

Personally, I'm happier having a free at the point of use service where everyone can expect a standard of care that is similar across the country. OK, some people won't like not being all private, some won't mind, but at the end of the day you've got to realise that all the things you want cost MONEY and it would mean raising taxes, which people always moan about.

Oh well, keep fighting to have curtains closed. Maybe the NHS will listen (they won't, because it is literally a first world problem).

expatinscotland

Let's be honest, the situation you're talking about is exceptional, not the norm, and you know it.

You seem to have some sort of vendetta against the NHS.

Personally, I have had my hysterectomy on the NHS and didn't have an issue. However, I also had an ingrown toenail removed in a private hospital (due to a long waiting list in my area for it) and the standard of care was awful.

It says something that when something goes wrong in a private hospital they dump them on the NHS.

The NHS provides an EXCELLENT standard of care, no matter what you claim. There are isolated incidents where they haven't, but the public satisfaction levels for the NHS are insanely high. They only dropped below 80% this year because of constant underfunding and waiting lists getting longer.

I'm sorry, but I won't sit by whilst you bash the NHS because you feel they invaded your privacy. Perhaps you'd rather be left to your own devices in a private hospital, where if there actually was a medical emergency they'd dump you at the local A&E. Maybe you'd be happy to be on a ward with an open curtain then...

The NHS delivers above most of Europe!

where everyone can expect a standard of care that is similar across the country.

can we now? That's new! Postcode lottery is not a urban legend. Just read the various testimonies, patients having such wide difference in care depending on their hospitals, and it's not just based on a friendly/not friendly nurse. Just read about it, information is widely available on the subject.

You might want to compare the statistics about PND casualties between countries, among other things, before being so smug about our NHS. You can try to minimise the "curtains problem", you are just denying that it's a reflection of the bad level of care.

The NHS provides an EXCELLENT standard of care, no matter what you claim

so you have a bad experience about an ingrown toenail and you can judge the level of care nationally, can you? Fantastic. If no one gives a shit about the well being of their patients, I am not sure why we even bother with hospitals in the first place, or let's save money on pain killers, shall we?

The statistics are utter nonsense. 3% in the UK had to wait more than 6 days for a medical appointment? Seriously? When is the last time you tried to see a GP exactly? The rest is just as farcial

YANBU OP.

The post-natal ward should absolutely allow women to have privacy, given that they will be getting to grips with using their breasts for feeding (needing to have your boobs out means you need privacy), it's not like having a leg or foot on display. And newborns often need to feed constantly.

Also, they will likely just have had damage to the other area of the body that also is private, a bleeding, bruised, stitched-together fanny.

What the fuck sort of a place are we living where it's "rainbows and unicorns" to not want to have to sit with private areas of your body on display to a ward full of random strangers' visitors, many of whom are men?

Quite frankly, if I wasn't allowed the curtains closed, I wouldn't have even attempted to breastfeed. No way at all would I have done that. Luckily, the midwives on my (high risk) PN were fantastic, and allowed me to have them closed over. It was never even mentioned. And I was high risk, so needed to be monitored more than the average PN woman, and it didn't stop them doing their job well.

Wow

You know, we can criticise aspects of the NHS without the usual shouty posts that remind us that the NHS is free (paid by whom?) and by definition so much better than anything they could ever do in Forrinland.

The image above only considers 2 European countries. Other countries manage to provide free care and dignity and respect. It's not either or. It's not difficult. This thread is full of people's experiences and they show that it is an attitude problem and not a money issue.

The problem is lack of compassion, empathy, and in some cases utter contempt for vulnerable patients. You see it occassionally in hospitals (most staff seem to manage politeness and professionalism without a problem) and it is also on this thread.

'Let's be honest, the situation you're talking about is exceptional, not the norm, and you know it.'

BOLLOCKS! And there are reams of threads even on here to that very point, not to mention a litany of law suits from the families of people whose babies and their mothers who died due to the lack of 'care' in postnatal units. We have one of the highest stillbirth rates in the industrialised world due to that lack of care starting antenatally, too.

I have no 'vendetta' just because I disagree with you that a patient's desire or need for privacy after birth or during labour are something that should not be respected because healthcare is free at the point of service.

I should say, my postnatal care was excellent and I had privacy.

My labour, on the other hand, was not. I had no privacy at all as I was left in the antenatal ward for my whole labour, no privacy at all. Next to non-labouring women.

But I'm so glad I got it in the PN ward, or that would have tipped me over the edge.

My worst experience with curtains was being on a g/i surgical ward after a gallbladder infection, and being next to a lady who'd been given medication to clear her bowels out for surgery. She was too poorly to get to the toilet so had to have a bedpan and the curtains round her...... I felt so ill myself that the sounds and smell just made me violently sick . The lack of privacy was appalling for everyone on that day.

Was in hospital last year and had the constant curtain battle. It would help if visitors didn't have a good nosy at all the other patients, very rude particularly when we are feeling so vulnerable and exposed.

Crumbs it is not tosh for the two London trusts I have worked for. I am aware there are no nationally mandated ratios but both trusts I have worked in had their standard staffing ratios, which would then be uplifted for either single room wards, or acuity, or sometimes both overlaid. These were the staffing ratios that were used for rostering, setting budgets and establishments. One trust had a significant number of single room wards (more newly developed accommodation) and certainly did not muddle along - they had a considered approach to the impact of single rooms which was led by the chief nurse, based on research evidence and agreed with the finance and trust senior team.

It is true that I cannot speak for all trusts but I would be very surprised if staffing adjustments were not usually made for single room wards, for reasons of safety.

YANBU. I kept my curtains closed the whole time I was on the postnatal ward and nobody tried to open them and I'm so glad. I couldn't walk and nobody had offered to help me wash and I was covered in blood (even my face), I kept bleeding through maternity pads, was trying to learn to breastfeed and to get the odd bit of sleep when I could as I'd had none for about 48 hours. My MIL was dying so I was also extremely upset and DH was at a different hospital with her. I really did not fancy making small talk with three other women and their husbands (especially the woman who had kept me awake all night by refusing to pick up her screaming baby and shouting abuse at all the staff). It might be easier for the staff to look at the patients, but my day on the postnatal ward was actually the worst day of my life, I really can't imagine how I'd have handled that in public view.

The NHS hospital I gave birth in four times, (one being an angel baby) only had private rooms with en-suite bathrooms. They even had a curtain a few feet in front of the door that gave an extra layer of privacy. Funny that the midwives and nurses were able to check on me if supposedly they can only do that in wards with open curtains.

If I didn't have the privacy then I would have been panicky and anxious. I am not normally a nervous person but in a hospital setting, particularly half dressed and after a major event like childbirth/loss I feel so extremely vulnerable that I would have never slept a wink. In fact, after DD1's birth, just the fact that I was within earshot of strangers and that midwives randomly popped in to check on me and DD, I didn't sleep for more than two hours total for the entire three days I was in. I left there a zombie.

With DD2 I woke every 10-20 minutes the one night I was in.

DS1 I left a few hours after the birth.

And yet my hospital is fanfuckingtastic in every respect. Great food, lovely staff and even free parking! God knows how I would have coped on a ward with open curtains!

The one i gave birth in (UK NHS) was mostly private rooms too thoushallnotpass. They did have wards for inductions and post surgery (i think you had to stay 12-24hours on ward for monitoring if you'd had a section) but most people in private rooms.

To answer the "keep battling to have the curtains closed, the NHS won't listen" post - yes, they will, they have to, you really cannot be forced to have you curtain open if that's not what you want.

Unicorns and rainbows to want a bit of privacy, god how cheeky are we eh? Dread to think what your minimum standard of care looks like. And roffle at "first world problem" and in the next post talking about having a toenail removed privately, whether intentional or not was vair amuse

I never claimed there aren't waiting lists - there are. And yes there are postcode lotteries for some things, but that's based on population areas more than anything.

If you break your arm, you can expect it will be treated the same in Liverpool as it would be in London. Or if you need a polyp removed from your bowels. You might wait longer in one area than the other, but the actual treatment and recovery will be similar.

And no, I didn't have a bad experience with my ingrown toenail, it's just that they didn't have any slots available until after the summer holidays and I didn't want time off work, so I had it removed privately. It was my choice and nothing to do with bad experiences. If I'd have had the luxury of being able to choose my holidays like other jobs, I'd have waited.

We do put money into our NHS, it's only free at point of contact but we still pay for it, and there are most certainly areas that are unjustly deprived from decent healthcare standards. I'm one of the lucky few who lives in the south and has received excellent care by nurses and doctors/ surgeons, with a level of privacy I could have never complained about. If that's possible where I was, then it should be possible where OP was having her postnatal care.

Slamming down the NHS is senseless; we need to slam this government who, unlike their promises at the GE, has systematically deprived the NHS from funding, demonised the standards of care received and promoted privatisation using STP's as an excuse. They steal from the poor to give to the rich and don't care whether there's a substantial amount of people who need to wait unreasonable times before they're seen to.

Perhaps the privacy of having the curtains closed is a first world problem, but if it is yourself whose dignity is not respected in any situation, you may squeak a different language!

Standards of care should be the same throughout the country! And the same goes up for Respecting privacy!

I had to spend 5 days in post natal care and it was quite honestly fucking appalling and horrendous, it was the worst 5 days of my life, even balanced against the absolute joy of having my newborn baby.

Visitors were allowed on the ward for 12 hours a day, I had had a long and difficult labour with an infection, no sleep for two days, all I wanted was to go to sleep. My curtains were constantly yanked open when I was trying to bf, I had Bounty people and tea ladies pull them open when I was having stitches/catheter checked, and they were supposed to be open all day, on a ward with 6 other women and all their various family members wandering round, while I was desperately trying to get half an hour of sleep. I had a catheter in and an IV drip for the first couple of days and felt extremely vulnerable. All I wanted was some privacy and some fucking sleep.

The midwives in that ward were absolutely awful, after 3 days we paid £100 per night which we could ill afford to go into a private room for the remaining two days, which meant my husband could stay overnight (sleeping on a chair) and I finally got an hour's sleep. I felt like I was going mad and was crying all the time.

If checks are the issue, as others have said then private rooms would not be allowed.

It was honestly so awful, I haven't detailed some of the worse things here because 2 years on it still makes me feel dreadful to think of them, but I have never experienced such an utter lack of respect and dignity at a time in my life when I needed it most.

I know some people will be reading this thinking I'm being a drama queen and want 'rainbows and unicorns'. I am not and I don't. I am from a family full of medical professionals and have the utmost respect for most of the hardworking people that make up the overstretched NHS but honestly, some post natal wards in this country are fucking horrific.

Gosh @JedBartlet that is a horrible experience xxx hope next one will be the way it should be