A question for NHS staff

[Glowinginthedark]

AIBU to think that no amount of money throw at the NHS in it current state will fix the issues? What is the real problem? Lack of funds or people completely abusing and misusing A&E or both?

Oh the one thing she does say is an issue is alcohol-related A&E admissions.

FruitCider! Are you on something? Not once did I suggest that “we” old school RGN’s were superior to trained nurses now. I trained and qualified and was a staff nurse/junior sister/senior sister. I worked on District and then was a Practice Nurse finishing my career as a diabetes specialist nurse. A varied career and contribution to the NHS, over many years.

You’re rather rude and very defensive. I suggest you reread your (and my) previous post and calm down a little.

She says the major issues are underfunding, understaffing (including the reliance on external staffing services) and, to some extent, the ageing population (though this is true in many other countries as well and their health services function fine thanks to better funding).

But she is probably a expert and should be ignored or/and discredited

Fruit and Suki in the sluice now ! Do you currently have blood/faeces/urine/phlegm on your garments ? if not, calm the heck down < and give the macerator a kick on your way out >

" (I'm always struck, as someone who paid for all my IVF treatment out of my own pocket, by the insistence that somehow IVF is the problem as I. it is a tiny proportion of the NHS budget; 2. the majority of infertile couples pay for their own treatment; and 3. it is the only treatment that creates future tax payers!)"

It also creates future drains on the NHS so I don't think that argument washes (who's to predict whether your future child will pay more in or take more out??) not digging at you and not especially anti IVF on nhs (though we do need to consider if we can be treating issues like that when things are stretched so tight other health conditions aren't being properly treated always) but that's a naive view to hold.

lol at 'nurses eat their young' not heard that anywhere else outside of nursing forums 😂

Thank you @peachgreen for sharing that, it is as I expected. I haven't got the exact figures but I am sure I read the UK spend 8 % of GDP on healthcare whilst other European countries spend 11% of GDP on healthcare. This is a big difference and must account for many of the problems. I am sure there are areas that could be improved but underfunding for current needs surely must be the biggest one.

All I know is do not want the UK to go down route to establishing a US private profit model of healthcare which leaves many people without sufficient health cover and bankrupting some if they are unfortunate to get an illness that needs a lot of treatment whilst the insurance companies make fat profits.

I would include health tourism as people who have a legal right to enter the UK specifically to benefit from better health services than the would get in their home countries.

Our trust has had to increased the provision to their paediatric diabetes and cystic fibrosis clinics as a result of the large numbers of families from Eastern Europe coming to the UK specifically to access better and free healthcare for their children. Both are very expensive life long conditions to treat and very few of these families will ever pay enough into the system for what they are getting from NHS.

I work for the nhs and wastage is a huge problem, both on the organisation's side and the public's.

Because it is a free service people don't value it and take it for granted. At my GPs surgery, 23 appointments were missed in one morning alone the week before Christmas! The health visitors run a 5 week baby massage class which also includes information on weaning, car safety etc. They invited 30 people to the most recent block and 14 showed the first week and from then on there was on average 8 people a class although 1 week there were only 4. There are waiting lists for this course which could be reduced if people would just say they couldn't attend.

I give out equipment as part of my job which is meant to be returned. There are even stickers on everything with phone numbers to call and they'll come and pick it up and yet lots of it still ends up in charity shops or on Gumtree! I understand that people are often just clearing someone's house after they've died and just sent everything away but it's still lost resources.
As has already been mentioned supplier costs are ridiculous. We had to get a new kettle through the official supplier which was £35 but the exact same one was £8 in argos!

Investment in social care would also help as many many people are stuck in hospital for months due to lack of carers, particularly in rural areas. Unfortunately not many people want to be carers and recruitment is difficult. More respite beds would also help as the amount of elderly people who are brought into the community hospital after family have pushed for admission and it then transpires that their family who care for them are going on holiday for a fortnight so the patient can't go home until they are back.

Andromeda I wonder how much it must it must cost those families to travel to seek the treatment you describe , if they are in fact resident in their home countries, given the difference between average annual salaries , but if you love your children I guess you would move heaven and earth to get them the treatment they deserve .

I’m not sure of the intakes now but I’ll bet it’s considerably less.

It was 280 adult nurses in DS2’s intake. When I trained in 1992, it was a 3 year course I waited 9 months (mainly because of the change over from the RGN to P2k), we had an intake of 33 twice a year.

I give out equipment as part of my job which is meant to be returned. There are even stickers on everything with phone numbers to call and they'll come and pick it up and yet lots of it still ends up in charity shops or on Gumtree!

I raised this exact issue with my line manager , having visited a local charity shop recently and seen a whole range of NHS provided equipment for sale , resplendent with stickers advising them who to call to return items . Problem is that the private company who supplies said equipment charges such an exorbitant rate to collect , that losing a zimmer frame to a charity shop probably only costs the NHS £3 , so not seen as such an issue , not sure how much someone using a mis-measured frame and falling and breaking their hip would cost the NHS in comparison ?

Finials !!!! for any therapists out there

I'm a hospital governor from a non medical background. Whilst I think our exec team are very good I am baffled by the wider NHS, the meetings I sit through with the same presentations month after month on change for change sake without addressing the actual issues is crazy. If you dare to ask "why?" It's normally a government directive but makes no sense. I also think the NHSis very "closed shop" and despite the staff shortages does little to attract new staff, I see presentations where they work for a year to do one trip to the Phillipines to get 8 nurses for example and see that as a good thing whereas I sat there going 8?!?! A year?!?! There is no comprehension of how unacceptable this would be in the private sector and that there are unemployed people on their doorstep crying out for opportunities or working together at a regional level with other hospitals -no logic is applied.

To answer the original question though I don't know what the answer is I just wish politics would leave it alone.

Another HCP here (GP).
Like peachgreen's friend it drives me insane when people blame the users of the NHS for it's problems. This is a diversion created by the government and the right wing media to shift blame away from the real problems.
As others have said- although lack of funding is not the only problem it certainly is by far the biggest contributor to the crisis. We spend far less of our GDP on health than other similar countries. Lack of social care means acute hospital beds are full of elderly people with nowhere to go. Horrific working conditions due to overcrowded hospitals with no beds lead to overstressed exhausted staff. Staff leave in droves and no one can be recruited to replace them.
Every time I talk to a group of GPs another dedicated long term member of staff is reluctantly leaving in order to preserve their sanity and mental health. Unsurprisingly no one wants to come in and take their place. So the remaining GPs cover the vacancy and do more and more work. So one by one they go off sick, retire early, leave. Same is happening with nurses, midwives, hospital doctors.
I have been in the NHS for 20 years and it has never been as bad as this. Once these staff have been lost it is going to take decades to replace them. And Brexit has destroyed the chances of recruiting them from abroad.
So front page stories about Nigerian twins are good for the government but have absolutely bugger all to do with it.

frumpety if they're from Romania or Slovakia it's the cost of a plane ticket, rent and once registered they can claim child benefits and DLA.
Most have to pay to see drs and their medicines in their own country it that's all free here. Often there are no specialists in CF or diabetes in their countries but here is the latest very expensive treatment in well equipped specialist centres. I don't blame the families for doing what they do but they haven't paid into the system and it means someone else's who may have contributed all their lives through their taxes don't get the treatment they need.

In our neonatal centre the majority of the premature babies are born to recent migrants from third world countries. This is because they tend to have a higher incidence of poor health which contributes to complications during pregnancy

Student nurses spend most of their training working on the wards and now they have to pay to do that.
One indication of how stressful these trainees are finding it can be seen by the Hugh drop out rate,how many newly qualified nurses actually take a job in the NHS and how long they stay I nursing.
At the moment nurses are grossly underpaid,they do an already stressful job with inadequate numbers and the hours mean that those with children struggle,any childminders do nights?Add to that the way we are often villified as a group if one of us has a bad day.
Until some of this changes(and Hunt seems intent on making it worse)the recruitment numbers will remain dire.
We are not angels or uncaring people we are a diverse group who still need to pay bills and like anyone can break under the strain.

The main issue I see is the lack of nursing / residential home beds and a lack of carers in the community. These factors are causing some major bed blocking in my area. There’s simply no beds, especially rehab beds as so many are waiting for placement / carers.

The current NHS model is a huge part of the problem with acute hospitals pitted against community healthcare. With sicker patients there needs to be more specialist acute provision in community to manage them.

We need paediatricians working in the community to deal with acute problems like reflux and seizures rather than just looking at development. We need geriatricians doing rounds in care homes and day centres picking up problems before the patient gets so ill they need to go into hospitals.

I found when you start delving deeper in the NHS problems there are so many hidden agendas that trying to change things is nigh in impossible

Frumpety I wouldn't mind so much if it was just zimmers or the like but when I was in the local large charity barn there were 2 hospital beds complete with stickers, multiple wheelchairs, toilet frames and bed levers galore as well as bins of nhs walking sticks and piles of zimmers. Everything had the stickers on. I have also seen hoists on Gumtree before. I know that we have had family members on the phone to our department saying if we don't collect stuff that day it will go to a charity shop as they want the house cleared before the funeral/ the family return home and we just can't do this as although we can order equipment for people it isn't us who collect things and we don't have a van etc. I don't know what the answer is.

Frumpety 😁😁😁💩

I worked nights for years because it allowed me to look after ds, who is autistic. To say that I was sleep deprived, would be an understatement and I look back now and wonder how I survived.

I have nothing but admiration for NHS employees. I know the conditions they work under after years of watching it being undermined by successive governments.

I work for a council in Scotland that is starting to integrate Health and Social Care with the NHS. (I’m not in that service myself, though.) The prevailing opinion seems to be that we might manage to reduce some of the problems caused by poor communication etc, but the bigger issue of bed blocking is a direct result of central funding being cut by Westminster.

There’s also a lot of discussion about prevention-based health and social care - the idea that by eg helping an old lady get to church/bingo etc you are strengthening her mental health and resilience, plus physical health as it encourages more movement. There are a lot of staff who think that we just can’t afford these things - but fire fighting once said old lady has been housebound for a year and has a fall due to reduced mobility isn’t working. So part of it is getting councils/govt/NHS trusts to try new things even if they seem counter-intuitive.

Frumpety we actually do pay now to go private as we have lost all confidence in the NHS.

Personally I have spent too many years in pain to have any confidence in the NHS and dp is paying the ultimate price for trusting drs

The last time I went to see my GP I had eczema in my scalp, in my ears,(I am now partially deaf because of the damage to my ears) down my back legs,face etc. I know it is due to allergies. This time it had really got out of control.
I asked if I could be tested to see exactly what I was allergic to.

Apparently there is no test .

She could write me a prescription for stuff that you can't use long term but after that what did I expect to happen.

@Oliversmumarmy, is there a test privately or science has yet to develop an accurate one?

I'm still shocked that we make NHS employees pay back their student loans, that there isn't a bill to be paid if you decide to leave the country for employment elsewhere and that we accept one foreign student to any NHS role with a known shortage.

My mother was a nurse and couldn't get a consistent schedule that enabled her to work with DC and a traveling spouse. She stopped work and later became needed MH care in part because she had depression from not working.

Another thing is that preventative care is expensive upfront. The NHS saying it's efficient is a misnomer to me because what I have seen repeatedly is huge costs in the last 5-15 years of life.

I live in the US and have a healthcare directive that tells everyone I don't want my life prolonged if I will have no quality of life. It's a fantastic piece of paper and they should be available at no cost in the UK.