To wonder how many elderly people in hospital die of neglect?

[Gone2far]

My poor elderly dad is in hospital. Whenever we visit, we're sorting out something. This morning, nobody had made sure he'd taken his medication and, when I pointed it out, they whisked it away. But then told my mother that he had had it.
The hospital is enormous, and you never seem to see the same member of staff twice.
I think it would be very easy for an elderly patient, who didn't have family or friends coming in, to be forgotten, apart from the absolute minimum of care.
Anyway,perhaps i'm feeling this because i'm worrying about my dad. But I know we can't be there all the time and feel helpless

I forgot about the time a week after my mum had chemo she went in to one hospital (with what turned out to be sepsis, no thanks to breast cancer doctor ) and they put her in a room with somebody who had d&v, she was discharged the next day, she took herself to another hospital a couple of days later where a night nurse wouldn’t believe her when she said she was having trouble breathing (they’d stopped her digoxin) because my mum was complaining about it she was moved wards where luckily enough they realised what was going on and saved her life

There are a few bad eggs but it’s mainly due to lack of staff, longer hours and poor funding. No one is keen on paying more taxes though, nor do they want to help with the caring either so sadly it it what it is.

Dad came out of intensive care and was prescribed halapeladol (excuse the spelling). I called one morning ‘yes he’s had a brilliant night, slept well etc etc’. An hour later I had a call ‘can you come down yours dads fallen several times in the night and ripped his drips out’ I said I’d already called and was told he had a good night, they said well he hasn’t. I couldn’t get down but had a friend who worked there, so she went to see him, until I could go down. When I got there I picked up his MARs chart, and no halapeladol had been given for two nights. I went straight to the senior nurse and pointed out that the consultant had prescribed it, so why wasn’t it given him, because if it had been given it, the previous nights episodes wouldn’t have happened. She couldn’t tell me why, could only apologise.

Hospitals would welcome volunteers to help.

In this country we've lost community spirit

Many, sadly. And anecdotally I've heard that there is a difference in outcomes based on whether the elderly patient has children who visit and ensure meals are had (as opposed to them being on the tray and the patient unable to eat them independently), and medications are taken. If you can have a rota and ensure someone is there for meal times and medication times. Wishing your Dad the very best. Hospitals are not a good place to be for the elderly unless acutely ill and in need of life saving treatment.

Maybe there needs to be a lot more HCA type roles so the nurses can deal with medications and medical things and the HCAs can do the feeding/personal care etc, if these roles needed no qualifications but to be able to pass a basic competency test and then be offered a weeks course, I'd do it in a heart beat. I'm desperate to get into nursing but I cannot afford the training, I'm 32 this year so my time to train is running out anyway so I've had to go into private community care where I don't need the qualifications, I am a capable and good Carer and deal with all sorts in the community but I don't have GCSEs so can't even do an access course locally to me even if I could afford it.
I can't volunteer because I need to work to be paid but I do help out when I'm not working at our local age concern day centre and provide care, company and cooking the hot meals for our clients.

100% yes
My gran was in hospital last year for 4 months. She has dementia and cant really articulate what she needs, can’t feed herself or hold a cup to drink. My grandad spent all day every day there feeding her etc. I took time off as did my dad to help him.

The nurse would come at 11ish when he’d been there since 8 and give her an injection after which she would hardly move. He thought it was to prevent clots. He believed they would only act in her best interest. My dad’s wife asked her one day what the injections were because gran was going downhill fast, no one could keep her awake to feed her. They didn’t really have an answer so she pushed and pushed.

They were sedating her due to ‘outbursts’. Which didn’t happen between the hours of 8 and 11, if at all. Yes she shouted when she was being changed or they were turning her to tend to her bed sores but she didn’t have the ability to be physical. They couldn’t be arsed/didn’t have enough time to tend to her or whatever the excuse was, they certainly had no reason to sedate her because after this the injections stopped.

We thought she was dying, 2 weeks later she was home. Still going, bless her.

When my father was in hospital towards the end of his life he was extremely frail physically but absolutely A1 in his mind. He was on a ward with a patient who had some sort of dementia and used to go wandering then get back in to the wrong bed. One day a doctor tried to give this chap an injection of blood thinners thinking he was the patient in the bed opposite my father (who had gone to the bathroom) when in fact it was the wandering patient. The doctor didn't check his arm bracelet, just the chart. If my father hadn't pointed out that he had the wrong patient there could have been serious consequences. So no op, YANBU!

BabyDarlingDollfaceHoney I’m not saying if you do this that it will change anything as clearly it’s a staffing and money issue, however from my student nurse stints in handover it’s always brought up, (watered down non swearing version) patient’s son has been in the phone complaining/asking about this so can we make sure it gets done as they’ll be complaining again when they get in

Another example is when I had my c section, I couldn’t reach my buzzer so I had to phone my husband to call the ward to get the staff to help me The nurse came over and apologised and in the morning the ward manager made a point of seeing how I was

Sometimes you have to make a fuss in order to fight for someone in wherever way you can to make sure they get the basic nursing care they should

However yes there may be a better way to get attention, I can only speak on my experiences and I’m open to learning about another approach

They also told my grandad they would arrange carers 3x daily then claimed my grandad has agreed to do the majority of the caring himself. He’s 78, he can’t physically turn my gran, can’t administer injections. Luckily my dad’s wife had attended all meetings re the care plan and spent the whole day calling whoever was involved, getting emergency cover etc. If she hadn’t been fighting his corner I dread to think what could have happened if there wasn’t family there.

It’s not just in hospital that things fall through the cracks, frankly it’s terrifying.

I must say though paying for a carer to go in when you can’t is definitely a good idea (obviously if you can afford to) and not one that I thought of

I’m thinking along the lines of realistically if this happened to a family member today what would I do

It certainly happens. It happens to non elderly adults with learning disabilities too.

Yes it happens. My father died in a hospital which in its last two CQC inspections has been rated as “requires improvement” in every category that related to his needs and care. Obviously, he was unwell but he wouldn’t have died how he did, when he did, if care had been better.

Its so sad to read all of these stories and we had a similar experience. My Grandfather had several hospital stays towards the end of his life and we spent the entire visiting time chasing up things that needed doing or correcting. He was repeatedly given whole food despite being on a liquid diet due to his tumour, this resulted in him choking. We also experienced staff ignoring us when he became confused and agitated (UTI), as we told them this wasn't normal for him and were told all old people are like this.

I could go on, after he died we pursued a complaint which resulted in the hospital apologising for some things they had failed to do but didn't make up for all of his suffering. I'm sorry to hear so many families have had the same devastating experience.

Yup it’s frightening the level of care if you can’t advocate for yourself and don’t have anyone else doing it for you.

I have been in a situation where my son who was 15 months at the time received horrible care in a childrens hospital. Our local hospital was superb and always is but one time he had to be transferred to ICU in a larger hospital. Care was fine in ICU but once transferred to a general ward they were useless. He has severe epilepsy and they had no rescue medication and failed to intervene when we told them he wasn't right and wasnt behaving normal. He continued to seize for hours. When finally they intervened they left me and Dp alone, no nurse to be seen, while they went off to get emergency meds from another ward. During that time he began vomiting during the seizure and sats were dropping. I had to pull an emergency buzzer, administer oxygen and suction him myself until someone came, at which point they had to put a call out and he was transferred back to icu. I cried with happiness when we were transferred back to our local hospital.

My Nan was in hospital for the last 2 weeks of her life, and it was so so upsetting. It took a long time to come to terms with how she died, and I wish to God we'd kept her at home as the outcome would have just been she went quicker and with far more dignity.

"Add to this the fact that no - you absolutely legally cannot force a patient to eat their food if they decline it, nor take their medication, not drink their water (all of this would be consider abuse) - and you have a situation where issues such as malnutrition & dehydration are entirely possible."

The problem isn't that I want staff to force my mother to eat or drink or take meds, but that when she is very ill/half asleep etc some staff members are extremely quick to jump to scrawling "refused!" instead of even spending two seconds to say "are you sure? You do need these you know" at which point my mother often wakes up enough to try.

Plus a single instance of "refusal" seems to get stuff removed for days, until we ask "why isn't she getting this any more?" and discover that apparently she said no once last Tuesday.

Add to that nursing staff who have prevented us from going onto the ward at mealtimes to help her eat, when she has not been eating (and they had not been taking a food chart until PALS were involved)...

I have every sympathy for staff struggling to do their job in the face of govt determination to run down the NHS so much that they can flog it off to US companies. But preventing carers from accessing wards to do basic care that the ward is not doing is just fuckery and I don't understand it. I would happily take work off their hands if allowed.

The experience of vulnerable people in hospital has been in my experience ABYSMAL. This includes my departed dsis who was mentally very unwell with a very serious psychotic illness for many years. The treatment old people receive in my experience is often substandard and too often uncaring too.

To those saying we need more volunteers. I’m very sorry but I have to work full time to pay taxes and national insurance to run hospitals and pay the staff. I would love to give up work and volunteer but sadly that isn’t going to happen until I am 67 at the earliest. Bloody cheek.

Ask yourself why there are 40,000 nurse vacancies in this country.

I got out early. Couldn’t cope with nursing 16 patients on my own anymore on a surgical ward.

Couldn’t cope with going home 2 hours late every shift knowing I hadn’t given the care I should have given.

So I’ve left the nhs for good, and it’s not just me. Every year thousands are doing the same.

I don’t have an answer. I always believed that you should treat a patient as you’d like your own family to be treated.

But the ridiculous staffing levels don’t let you.

My best friends dad was in a hospital which had 4 floors, he had a serious water infection so was very confused. She had been to see him on the Tuesday but couldn't go on the Wednesday, when she went on the Thursday he wasn't in his bed. She asked around and it seems as though he had been missing from early Wednesday morning no one contacted her. It took to the next Monday to find him at the bottom of the fire escape dead.
He had opened the fire door which was supposed to set an alarm off which didn't work.No one looked around that area as in the hospitals word no on uses that door.
At the inquest the police hadn't been called until my friend came on the Thursday. He died of exposure.

My mum died last week after a fortnight in hospital. The first week was spent in ICU so the care was second to none and one to one

She was then moved to a single room but classed as a ward I suppose. We were aware she didn't have long so I took it upon myself to be there practically full time. The care I witnessed was good but it wasn't the care that I could give myself.

It's the small things. Her teeth. Putting her glasses on. Ensuring a nasty sore on her arm was always completely covered. Some water in a sponge when she needed it. Lip balm to keep her chapped lips comfortable. Making sure things like her phone were within her reach. Pulling up her blanket when she felt chilly. Such tiny things but she was suffering with some delirium after the stay in ICU so she couldn't speak up properly for herself.

I have nothing but praise for the nurses and doctors but it was me and me alone who attended to her and fought for anti sickness meds, sleeping meds, etc etc

I'm satisfied she was pain free and comfortable at the end so I have no complaints but I can fully see how people in hospital do not receive the care they deserve. I had to make sure my mum received it

I'm sure it's loads. Living longer costs money - many times people have complex medical conditions and drug needs. The solution is not for volunteers to dish out social and medical care. That's simply never going to happen, it's a skilled job for a reason and should be remitted accordingly. But it won't so people will continue to die.

@HoraceCope

Yes, Spanish nurses who I have worked with have been suprised at how little most families get involved here, apparently in Spain family members take it in turns to help care for their relatives whilst they are in hospital, so they do things like helping their relative to wash and eat, drink etc.