Nurses watching tv/surfing the internet

[UB40fan]

My daughter was recently in hospital. While there we witnessed nurses watching an hour long tv show and surfing the internet. It was quiet in the hospital at the time. I was stunned by this. The nurses were quite open about this, as in this was obviously allowed. Am i the one behind the times or is this now normal?

Inciteful again Crushed. Yep, so pleased you left the NHS. Please don't go back, I think it's your attitude that some of us are afraid of when in hospital, feeling ill and vulnerable.

I think paffuto that you have mistaken me for an actual nurse.
Let me reassure you that no patients have been harmed by my incitations of apparent hatred upon them

Also shuyler, I can remember years ago nurses sleeping on their break on a mattress in an office or an empty bed in a side room but in my experience this simply doesn't happen these days.

It certainly does still happen. We use a spare parents bed in our storeroom!

@cathf, How much would you expect for a degree educated profession which often involved long unsocial hours, high stress and a definite pay ceiling? I'm genuinely asking, I think there's a perception generally that care work should be cheap, it's a shame as it puts people off working in care and keeps HCA work in care homes paid at around £1000pcm.

There is no way a London hospital wouldn't have a block on streaming sites. I also wonder is this is mandatory training, that usually takes a good hour.

Thank you, paffuto - it was indeed horrific to see the man my FIL was die the way he did because of incompetence, then to watch the attempted cover up afterwards

Important to note that not all nurses are like this though; like everywhere you get good and bad, so it's disappointing to see blanket defensiveness rather than much will to oust those who are, frankly, a stain on the profession

Was this a night shift? I’m a nurse and do play on my phone during the night when I am free. During the day it’s unprofessional. I do get my phone out to check the time/date if my brain is exhausted, use it as a stop watch or calculator, google stuff or write (non cofidential) stuff down that I mustn’t forget x

Anyone who thinks nursing is a protected profession on mumsnet is living in cloud cuckooland Every thread involving the NHS invariably attracts loads of posters telling us that good nurses are far and few between. We're lazy, unsympathetic and dishonest just for starters.
I accept that there are bad apples in every profession and don't doubt some of the dreadful tales on here but to tar all of us with the same brush is blatantly unfair.

@Xmas2020

Control would have indeed known my exact location! It wasn't bunking off!! :) If there are no calls then we don't have work to do, it's not like we can go door to door asking if people feel unwell.

I work on an car as a solo responder and live in a relatively central location - i.e. a reasonable place to be on standby waiting for calls to come in. So long as I can be mobile in the car within 30seconds of the call coming to me then that's reasonable - i.e. the same time as we have if on standby at an ambulance station.

I always go where I'm told but if there are no calls to send me to so long as I'm in a central location then everyone is happy. If the dispatcher felt that there was too much cover in my area they'd radio me and ask to go elsewhere which obviously I'd do. The other night though very low call volume so I was able to spend a few hours at home with the family which was very welcome!

Late to the debate but employer expected me to do all sorts of annual stuff online. Work related but certainly not paid for if done on your own time; annual nursing registration, whimis, cpr, workplace safety, workplace surveys, continuing education. Every shift I’d have something online to fill out and do. Vacation request, shift changes all done online. Then there were the emails...planned power outages, water off between X-Y hours, intrim manager for here, new hire for there. All with read receipt and all mandatory.
It could easily look like I was having a fun time playing solitaire.

Nurses have to work for free, no go in to debt while in uni now. That's 3 years of debt while on the rota for the NHS.

An entry level nurse gets about £200 per month after tax more than a person working a full time retail job.

For that £200 they get the pleasure of not being allowed to go to the toilet, dealing with irate patients addicted to opioids, being punched, bitten, and spat on. They work overtime oftentimes unpaid and wipe poo all day. The occupational health hazards are practically unparalleled by any other career. If you want to begrudge a nurse taking a moment to breathe for her mental health, and looking at a computer then you are being cruel. You have no idea what that nurse may have just tended to. All the death and suffering could easily burn out the strongest among us. Nursing is a calling and they should be respected. They deserve so much more than they get and I wouldn't want to shun a nurse to the greener pastures of another country where she could be paid much more.

I agree that nursing (along with some other professions) is regarded as beyond criticism on mn.

And I haven't seen anyone on this thread saying that all nurses are lazy, but pointing out their actual lived experience - which some posited have been at pains to deny. You can see why the NHS is so shit at dealing with complaints and issues when they all close ranks and deny there's any issue.

But op I agree that it's odd and unprofessional what you saw. And I have seen similar (St Thomas' London general cardiology Ward if anyone's interested) where I'd never seen such a lazy set of humans in my life. I (as a visitor) helped a couple of old boys get to the toilet, find them a urine bottle and help them eat food.

ICU and high dependency were amazing and they definitely didn't have breaks etc and conformed much more to the stereotype of overworked and underpaid. The general Ward lot spent most of their time gossiping and eating round the nurses station and ignoring the bells (which I often answered as I couldn't stand by and watch people needing basics).

No doubt posters will deny I has that experience but I have the photos and complaint docs to prove it.

We need to recognise that no profession is above criticism. Mine certainly isn't (civil servant) and I agree there are lazy, arrogant, aggressive and ignorant civil servants - as I've met them! I don't take offence when people on mn say they've met a shit civil servant (normally in DWP) as I know they're not talking about me - as I work bloody hard and go the extra mile. So all you nurses taking offence - if you're one of the good ones then this thread is not about you!

I don't understand why nurses are allowed to have phones on the Ward. Do they need them for their job? If not I'd think it was a huge safeguarding issue. Patients are vulnerable, I've worked in Nurseries and Primary schools, all phones are banned.

If I'd seen what you saw OP, I would not hesitate to make a complaint.

Anne

I don't think anybody is denying other peoole's experiences, rather they are stating what an unusual occurance it woyld be for an NHS nurse to have access to TV from an NHS computer.
As somebody who frequented NHS wards and worked in the NHS for over a decade, it certainly is highly unusual if not just plain unlikely.

The attitude to nurses such as 'our taxes paying them to watch TV' etc are insulting to a profession who actually pay to train as nurses and work for free whilst exercising such a privilege.

Also, our taxes categorically do not pay them a salary which is commensurate with their level of education, nor the weight of respinsibility placed upon them.

Pretty soon those with three B's at Alevel won't bother training to be nurses, why should they when they are viewed as waitresses and customer service assistants.

The lack of respect for nurses is one of the greatest 'acheivements' of our present government.

The thing about certain social media sites being blocked - somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, but surely that only applies when using trust owned equipment?

I'm just not sure how personal phones / tablets / whatever can be blocked, considering patients use them all the time?

Crushed No. The lack (if any) of respect for nurses will have been brought about by very bad experiences some patients have suffered.

Well paffuto I'm afraid that belies what I would perceive to be as a woefully poor attitude to and a lack of respect for a whole profession on the basis of poor experiences with some individual(s)

With that in mind, going forwards I think I'll leave it there with you if you don't mind.
You've told me who you are and I've listened.

I hope you realise that 'these days' a nurse is lucky to get a 5 minute break and if the buzzer goes that nurse had to end the break and doesn't get another one.

I wonder why some posters are intent on making excuses for nurses watching an hour long TV show whilst being responsible for people's lives.

It's not about everyone 'closing ranks' or being 'beyond reproach'. If someone comes on here complaining about poor care - and I mean actually poor, not that you had to wait to get the TV channel changed - I am in agreement 100% that it shouldn't happen. Professionals shouldn't make serious mistakes, shouldn't be rude to patients, shouldn't make you wait for urgent matters. That has happened and it is wrong.

Its threads like this. Someone saw literally a snapshot of a nurses day, and then come on a forum to have other people complain with them when realistically they have no idea what is going on in that nurses day.

No idea if they had a break, no idea if they stayed late the past 3 days then picked up at extra shift today to keep the ward safe, no idea if their patient just died, no idea if they've ran to the bathroom today - just no idea what their job generally entails.

So it does make nurses defensive when people come on here and complain about minor things that do not affect them. My first post in this thread was that I didnt see a problem IF patients needs had been taken care of. And I stand by that. Its 2 different issues.

The thing about certain social media sites being blocked - somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, but surely that only applies when using trust owned equipment?

OP said she saw the nurse sitting at the nurses desk at the computer for an hour, not on her phone. Obviously there is no way to block what people look up on their own devices.

I'll bet the nurses were probably on a break but chose probably due to understaffing not to leave the ward for their allotted time but to keep a proper eye on their patients so instead of watching TV in the staff room they watched it online in this instance.

Plus how do we not know that what they were watching wasn't say a training programme or something medical related to a patients care.

OP hasn't worked in 30 years so spends her free time hanging around the hospital probably annoying her daughter and the medical staff to while away her time.

@Puzzledandpissedoff,

Staff use different wifi network to patients usually.

As for pay, when I started as a new Band 5, it was £23,023 gross. No enhancements. Take home was just under 18,000.

I had no issue with the pay. It was the working conditions (poor staffing) on a heavy 36 bay surgical ward with 5 nurses and 3 HCAs (on a good day!)
Definitely no time for TV!

when I worked as a midwife at a busy central hospital, it was normal to work after your shift ended, normal to have no break, never an official break always "grab something to eat and drink, have a pee" when you can, normal to have far more patients to care for than was safe 3 women on delivery suite!! normal to be the only qualified midwife on a ward with 22 women and babies, including high risk antenatals, inductions, post sections, jaundiced babies etc etc

so on the incredibly rare shifts when it was quiet yes I would be surfing the internet, reading or just sitting on my arse, buzzers were still answered, meds still given and care of any sort when it was needed. I left the profession that I mostly loved, because I was burnt out, knackered, demoralised and genuinely terrified someone would be hurt or die, because I was so busy and tired. my own family were getting the worst part of me, I still miss midwifery, but from the bashing HCP get here and in the press, from friends still working who are under even more pressure and stress I am so glad to be out of it.

So many posts on mumsnet have people saying, Im in the office trying not to laugh at something they have read on here, on every funny thread you will find a lot of them, but hey thats ok because your taxes are not paying their salaries........

Crushed

But saying it's unlikely is basically saying the op (and the other posters with their experience) is making it up isn't it?

And surely there are many professions which don't get the pay they deserve? But that's not an excuse for anyone not to do their job properly and professionally.

That attitude of 'all nurses/healthcare workers are angels' does not do either the NHS any favours. Nurses are professionals and should both be treated, and behave as such.

Unprofessional behaviour should not be tolerated just because last week they had a busy shift and didn't get a break. Not getting a break is of course not on, but neither is excusing behaviour like the op and others report.

I bet peoples heads would explode if they knew I watched an entire film with a patient on Sunday. To an outsider it looked like I was tossing it off but the reality is he opened up to me more during that 90 minutes than he had at any point during our regular, formal 1:1 sessions. It was truly invaluable.

Not saying that's what's happening in the OP but just find it slightly amusing... we also cooked a meal and shared it together later in the evening (I'm insanely lucky to work in a sort of well staffed forensic rehab).