To think people who are ill visiting someone in hospital are selfish?

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Multiple times when my granddad was in hospital with only 5% of his lungs working, he was made incredibly ill with gastroenteritis. We couldn't see him and he was eventually classed as an 'end of life patient' but he didn't give up the fight until 4 months after this. He was in and out of hospital for four years and always made ill by visitors.

So my hospital is closed essentially aside from maternity and A&E. I'm due any day and it's shut down due to norovirus.
I have an 11 month old and I know dcs dad Is bound to catch it when we go when I give birth.
I'm so worried my newborn will be ill with norovirus. Myself included cause I'm emetophobic and my dd.

If you're ill, don't visit people in hospital! 😖

During BMTs, the infections I got which almost killed me came from my own skin. I also ended up with bird flu, c diff and some other delights despite only being visited by my parents and sister who wouldn’t have come near me if they so much as sneezed.

Of course it’s selfish to go to a hospital to visit if you’re ill, but the bigger picture is that people in hospital harbour infection and are more susceptible to illness. You can also carry illnesses and infections you don’t have symptoms for.

Can't you go to the MLU that's in the Samuel Johnson Hospital? It's not a real hospital so unlikely to have the germs.

Are you for real daisy? Anywhere which has people has germs

C diff for example is really easily spread and is caused (often) by antibiotics.

When I had my son in hospital, there was a Mum who was in the antenatal ward who had Noro virus. The loo and shower nearest her were out of bounds to everyone and there was tape and warnings across the door to the private room they put her in. Any medical staff who went in put protective clothing, shoe covers, masks etc on and fully decontaminated their hands etc when they came back out. It was managed really well and contained. Hope that helps in some way-I think they did really well to protect everyone.

Oh I'm sorry I went out of my way to look for an alternative for OP to put her mind at ease.

What do I know about the place? Nothing at all apart from my relative was there recently before they died. To quote the ward manager, 'We don't even do cannula's as this is a rehab unit for mostly the elderly not a hospital as such. When dying relative needed treatment they would have needed to be blue lighted to the nearest HOSPITAL.

My guess is that unless a foxy visitor brings the patients a delight like norovirus in. The maternity unit is in a separate building, completely away from the rest of the rehabilitating patients.

Unless you're going to offer something constructive, why bother with anything at all?

I would say with your 11 month old they just don't like being sick over having a full blown phobia. As someone who lived with it for a long time I wouldn't go on rides, I wouldn't drink, I wouldn't eat foods that I considered high risk. I would hyperventilate and have a panic attack at the thought of anyone being sick for any reason. My most famous moment when my ex was sick when I was first cohabiting, I called my parents to come look after my super drunk 30+ year old boyfriend. Even my siblings new just mention the s word & I was out of there like a bolt. (Baby making machine for Mum, big age differences between youngest and eldest.

How have you coped being pregnant twice in a year with the phobia. With Both I had crazy all day sickness, they were years apart because of this.

YANBU - obviously they're not selfish if they don't know they're coming down with something; but if they're ill, or only just over being ill (so, for example, less than 48h since last episode D &/or V), or know they've been in contact with someone unwell & may thus be incubating something (trotting along the child whose entire class has been coming down with chickenpox, for example) - that's Not On.

Hospitals are full of very unwell people whose bodies may, in the worst case scenario, not be able to cope with infections of this sort at all. Even people who're normally well are fairly likely to be more unwell than usual & to need an extended stay if they contract something while they're in hospital as it'll be complicated by whatever's landed them in hospital. Working to try to prevent the spread of norovirus within a ward is also more labour-intensive: it might be closed, but they'll have to play musical beds, & tbh having enough staff to ensure that they can split between nori patients & not really is NOT always a thing - & barrier nursing takes that bit more time to do everything for each patient, as gloves & aprons don't just need changing between each patient, but also between "clean" & "dirty" tasks. There's also additional paperwork; [ensuring] extra cleaning; & invariably extra bed changes (into special linen sacks that you have to get porters to collect asap)... the deep clean at the end the outbreak is a huge amount of work too.

King's College Hospital in London has huge stands up at the moment with alcohol gel pumps reminding everyone to clean their hands as they enter - the main message on them, however, is telling visitors that if they've been unwell they mustn't come onto the wards. I think there are details beyond the enormous headline message (as it were), but as I'm only going in for appointments I've never stopped to read... I think that the National Hospital for Neurology & Neurosurgery had something similar & the Guy's & St Thomas' Trust might have as well... 🤔

TBH though, a lot of hospital visitors behave selfishly: more than the permitted 2 people at a time; however many of them are there making enough noise for about 20-200; bringing in children & letting them roam about the ward (& go through people's stuff, try climbing on other patient's beds, mither at other patients, fiddle with mobility aids, crawl on the floor, run about the bay); use the patient toilet rather than take going out &/or be affronted by the patients being in the patient toilet when their child needs the toilet; make it clear they think patients are being precious if they don't want children Investigating IV/enteral feed pumps & lines/tubes; loudly eating huge amounts of smelly food; complaining to/nag at staff about imaginary [non-]issues; demanding the attention of staff (for non-urgent issues!) when they are dealing with other patients/on drugs rounds; staying well past the end of visiting hours & being furious when asked to leave...

Myself included cause I'm emetophobic

Have you had a formal diagnosis?

Or do you mean like the rest of us, the smell of vomit makes you retch, as its an age old bodily defence to toughing/picking up stuff full of bacteria that will harm us?

I imagine OP is genuinely phobic if she's so afraid of the actually low risk of catching noro that she's avoiding going into her hospital whilst she's in labour.

Hope things have gone well overnight.

"surprisingly my dad was able to walk on the ward without being stopped, no offence to any nurses that work there but it’s so dirty I’m not suprised there are outbreaks"

@ilovegin112
Sorry but I find that incredibly offensive. I am a nurse, I am not a cleaner. I don't see myself as being above cleaning at all, but I am responsible for looking after between 8 - 16 patients every shift, with the help of one healthcare assistant; we don't have time to do any deep cleaning. Everyday is different; but the majority of patients need help with washing, using the loo, eating, drinking, taking tablets, and close monitioring cos they're ill! I also need to trail around on the doctors round, admit patients, plan discharges, update relatives, work with the therapy staff, order stuff from pharmacy, and document everything at least twice in the ridiculous paperwork.

I run round and disinfect patient tables and make them use the hand sanitiser before every meal. If I had a more manageable amount of patients, I wouldn't mind cleaning more at all (that's how they did it back in the good old days!) I agree that wards are fairly dirty places, but if you want to blame someone, blame budget cuts and outsourcing the majority of hospital cleaning jobs to private companies. Not the nurses. We're just trying to get to the end of most shifts in the hope that all the patients will be okay by the end!!

I wasn’t actually blaming the nurses or saying that they should be cleaning the wards but you would think that in a hospital that had been shut for the second time in a fortnight with norovirus that somebody should have stopped him getting onto the ward

Noro, and other viruses, might have been carried in to the hospital by staff (especially in the hours/day before symptoms appear).

Banning all non-essential movements in and out of a hospital where there is an outbreak might help damp it down a bit. But it doesn't give any information about how the outbreak started.

A compleyptely hypothetical example: one person in the hospital kitchen showing first symptoms at end of shift might has potentially infected every single ward with in-patients.

When I was little in the 1970's I had a three year period of being in and out I feel hospital a few times a year.

ikeepaforkinmypurse you mention banning dc, dc were not allowed to visit. I remember having to wave to my little sister through the window as she wasn't allowed in.

I think norovirus in hospitals is caused by people admitted to hospital with norovirus rather than visitors.

I'm sure I know which hospital this is as it's local to me. The Trust has said the norovirus was brought in by a visitor.

We have just spent three weeks in a neonatal unit. Visitors where allowed In the evenings. One lady visited several times, she was clearly full of a heavy cold each time, coughing and spluttering and she kept pulling she face mask down to talk. It was so selfish. We spoke to the nurses about it and they said there was little they could do. Her actions could have killed a child.

When i had ds2 the hospital was closed for norovirus.. i had a quick, straightforward water birth and was offered a "6 hour discharge". I was at home tucking into a big mac and having a glass of wine within 12 hours of having him!

Anyway i digress, you would be very unlucky to catch it, the hospitals shut down wards and stop visitors exactly to stop the spread. Plus if youre in and out your contact with others will be minimal!

Good luck with the birth!

I don't need a diagnosis for emetophobia. I know myself my phobia.
I know it's not normal to run in the opposite direction and flee a house when someone is sick. I try and deal with it with my dd (she isn't emetophobic by the way, I must have panicked if I put that accidentally typing)
If someone is sick near me, I'll shake.
I'll run.
When dp has norovirus before my brothers funeral I left him for 3 days
During that time he was sick I fled his house and starved myself for days.
I then read grape juice is meant to stop it so all I did was drink gallons of it and make myself really ill with my stomach as I wasn't eating. Honestly. I wish for the low key phobia where it just made me gag. I can't deal with it else this would not be a problem.

@daisy Samuel Johnson have an Mlu? That's perfect! Thank you I'll have a look in my notes for a number. I'm still having really bad infrequent pains and I'm scared my waters will go any minute but I'll definitely phone. Ours has shut :(

@brats, yep, that's the one. Written in every article. It seems to be really common though so I've read?

Have you thought about contacting your midwife and discussing the possibility of having a homebirth yet OP?

I can't for the life of me get in touch with her but I shall be seeing her tomorrow if little boy can hold on. Only people I can get in touch with are the midwives at the hospital but they won't give me my midwife's number :(

not RTFT but it's not just visitors who bring in illness. Our last bout was brought in by a member of staff. Even patients bring it in.