How many people have been failed by the NHS during lockdown?

[Polnm]

My DH has cancer.

His appointment in April was by phone
His appointment in August was postponed until October

How is this acceptable? Hospitals are empty whilst patients can’t access care.

GP appointments by zoom with a 2 week wait for a basic blood pressure check in person or to take bloods

Why isn’t there more publicity and outrage about this?

We can’t be the only family going through this surely?

Private hospitals have been used since around March/April for Covid, and got a very good financial deal out of it.

Using the nursing staff like that is batshit. Thankfully this trust have some common sense and it's only the patient who gets transferred over, always has been the case. Not sure I'd want my surgery done if I was aware of this knowing if shit goes wrong they don't have the emergency equipment needed (at least the ones I have used don't)

And why should it matter where the staff works? THey were all trained together lol. And if batshit stuff like this happens, no wonder some wards/departments are short staffed. Talk about incompetence.

@canigooutyet

Exactly! And the operations they are doing are the same types of operations the private clinic was doing anyway! (Knees, hips etc) - so just send the patient!!!

That's crazy. So the private clinic could be operating at the same time as the NHS theatre - so double the surgeries - but that isn't happening because the NHS staff are working in the private hospital? Who on earth devised that plan?

Surely using private hospitals is about increasing capacity not keeping it the same?

Yes that’s exactly what has happened. Crazy

hearhooves
I am sorry to hear that you are having such a struggle to get access to the medical care you need. It is indefensible and inexcusable. It is not the fault of the government. It is entirely the fault of the local NHS, its managers, its employees, and its appalling ongoing failure to prioritise patients. It is also the failure of the fourth estate to report this. This is absolutely not happening in other developed countries. The stories on this thread should be headline news and those responsible for these decisions should be sacked and exposed. Hooves, I hope you get the medical care you need. Nobody should be put through this. It's a disgrace.

Surely using private hospitals is about increasing capacity not keeping it the same?

One would have thought so. Barking mad.

And why aren't staff in that hospital speaking out about the lunacy of it all?
Don't you guys have Unions?
In education when ht wanted to implement something batshit that would impact the students, we got the union involved and the policy was squashed.

Where are your unions talking about these issues raised? Where are your people demanding to get services back because of the loss of live and the long term implications of all patients? Where are your people saying excuse me but it should be all patients getting treatment not just Covid?

NHS are accountable simply from their deafening silence, unless of course it involves opening up schools. Mmm wonder how many of them are parents!!

@BovaryX

hearhooves I am sorry to hear that you are having such a struggle to get access to the medical care you need. It is indefensible and inexcusable. It is not the fault of the government. It is entirely the fault of the local NHS, its managers, its employees, and its appalling ongoing failure to prioritise patients. It is also the failure of the fourth estate to report this. This is absolutely not happening in other developed countries. The stories on this thread should be headline news and those responsible for these decisions should be sacked and exposed. Hooves, I hope you get the medical care you need. Nobody should be put through this. It's a disgrace.

Thank you.

Do you know why these stories aren't headline news? Because they are two a penny, they are common place,, they are happening every single day to many people across the country.

Have you sat in meetings where staff have remained silent? Obviously not.

We are not silent but many of us are working harder than ever, the constant changes, staff being redeployed, the dealing with staff and patient anxiety, the added work this all has created. It’s been utterly exhausting (and no I don’t feel worthy of being clapped)

So yes us guys do speak out but I can’t remember the last time I had the time to sit and read letter/notices from unions, or had time to engage with union reps. Any spare time which will be while I’m eating my lunch (late in the afternoon) will be often reading the new updated procedures we have to be aware of and need to follow or updating my notes. When I leave work (often having done unpaid overtime) I want to leave it behind. It’s been utterly exhausting and I have a life out of work too and we have our own issues to deal with.

We know the NHS needs changes this isn’t new but no government is willing to risk this too much, we know terrible mistakes have been made but if you think this is purely down to NHS management and not through government then you really have very little understanding of how the NHS works.

Yes I have sat through meetings and colleagues have remained silent, but very vocal in the staff room. I stopped listening to their whinging and suggested they bloody say all this in the meetings.

That is you that is overworked at the moment. Not everyone in the NHS is. I do know people in various fields who don't understand what is going on themselves. I have told them the same, until they stop whining about it privately don't bother coming to me. The SM stuff posted also suggests it's not that busy. Other posters within NHS have said they aren't busy.

Yes I know how the government works. I am aware of how they set and frequently change policies with no notice. I am aware that when they set policies you cannot opt out which is the case at the moment it seems because of the blaring obvious lack of consistency across the country.

Many people who work in the public sector work long hours unpaid, are on their knees on a daily basis not just at the time of a pandemic.

There would have been uproar if a whole fire or police station had closed indefinitely because well over worked, underfunded and understaffed.

Look at how pissed off people got because the schools closed.

If I as a neglected patient go public and highlight the issues then what it the point when NHS staff will say well that's not the case here? Or I'm too overworked to notice departments aren't open, when most of these departments are also used on hospital patients.

I'd like to switch off from the mental load the lack of treatment and medical care, and the anxieties this causes myself and family. But until departments open that can do this it's impossible. The added stress this is causing could be the reason why my dd is in hospital. She took care of her health and there was nothing wrong with her until last week. She went private for yearly comprehensive tests and her last one was in February. SHe's got the gizmos that monitor her stats built in to whatever. She didn't want to be like me in 20 years time, broken.

Do you know why these stories aren't headline news? Because they are two a penny, they are common place,, they are happening every single day to many people across the country

Sadly hooves given the multiple posters on this thread describing an ongoing failure to access any healthcare at all, I suspect this is true. Watching this from a distance, it never ceases to amaze me that millions of people in the UK experience third rate healthcare or in the current situation zero healthcare because of the bizarre, quasi religious fetish which has been constructed around the NHS. As the author of the Francis Report said a couple of years ago, the gap between its failings and the giddy rhetoric which is used to describe it is a serious impediment to any serious reform. There is a reason this paradigm is not replicated anywhere else on the planet.

It is when departments continue to operate a system that is failing everyone.

See my pp.

When a department has got fifteen thousand missed appointments every month for well over 10 years and when you question it the reply is because this is how it is always done. You know nothing is going to change because the people working there don’t give a shit.

I could call my dr over a few issues I am having but I run over the conversation in my mind in what would happen if I actually made an appoint to see a GP at my surgery.
I come to the conclusion it isn’t worth my time or effort or the cost of parking because I come out with nothing.

I have got desperate occasionally and convinced myself that this time would be different but I come out with still nothing.

Do you know why these stories aren't headline news?

1. Because the NHS is the national religion that people aren't allowed to critise.

1. Because the mainstream media are too lazy to plan/research/report anything new or unusual. There was so much devoted to the A and GCSE results because it's something they do every year and there's always the same controversy about grade inflation, always the easy reporting of filming a few students opening their envelopes. It's formulaic reporting - just "dust off" what they did last year and repeat.

I despair when there is so much attention given to exam results which affected a couple of hundred thousand kids when absolutely nothing has been done to highlight the plight of up to 3 MILLION self employed who've fallen through the cracks in Rishi's crazy covid support system and are losing their homes, businesses and savings. Lots of people have contacted the media but they're not interested!

canigooutyet you wrote

And why aren't staff in that hospital speaking out about the lunacy of it all?
Don't you guys have Unions?

If you have sat through these meetings or in the know why are you asking these questions ?

I can assure you these questions are being asked but many of us we are too damn busy to think of anything but providing essential care under very difficult circumstances with our workload being increased.

I’m well aware many in the public sector work many unpaid hours overtime I’m also very aware how much areas need a shake up.

What has that got to do with hospitals not being able to function fully because of the risks involved. As I said before mistakes have been made this isn’t acceptable but you are wrong if you think these issues are just dismissed they are not we are just doing our damn best to get through this

Where are you watching from BovaryX ?

@ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN I think people just want to vent on here, not interested in other experiences or anything positive 🙁

I think the suggestions we’re spending time posing on SM rather than opening clinic demonstrates the level of critical thinking.

Why am I asking questions about Union. or staff speaking out because as I explained, the silence is deafening to the outside world.

We know the issues faced in other areas because other areas are speaking out about them.

Aren't we supposed to ask questions why there is a lack of care currently in the NHS?
Aren't we supposed to ask why aren't you getting the Unions properly involved? We all know when Unions are properly involved they are constantly in the media.

One thing I know about union members, we know how things aren't working because people constantly talk. NHS have whatsapp groups etc to help keep in the loop. How long does it take to fire a quick question to the union rep?

I am sorry but all I hear is excuses that it's someone else's fault.

It's the government's fault because of x, y and z. What they did was barbaric to the elderly and we only know the exact circumstances because NHS spoke out. But of course, the question should also be why didn't those medics speak up beforehand and get it in the public's attention to help stop what happened?

It's the patients fault they are still waiting to be seen hours after their appointment time. It's patients fault that departments are closed. It's the patients own fault because they aren't alerting various people to their problems. It's the patient's own fault their appointments have been cancelled essentially indefinitely. Or was it the government's fault? I forget who is to blame.

NHS. erm we are following the guideline set out by the government that might not actually exist because not all nhs is following them.,

It's the schools fault we are seeing an increase of children patients because they are closed, ignoring the blatantly obvious that their lack of care at the moment is causing more problems on the whole.

are you a teacher canigooutyet ?

At the moment I have the energy to do my work and all the extra work. I certainly speak out in meetings as I have staff and those we manage needs to think about. In meetings our planning goes constantly back and forth and we have been under pressure to resume normal service but when we look at how we can do that it simply doesn’t work we have to work around COVID

But you have no idea of the reasons why. Risk is one of them, lack of staff (in my area we do not rely on bank staff it’s our absolute last resort). The impact on our patients we are managing. It’s not as simple as let’s all get back to work wear masks and socially distance there are many many things to consider. We make plans to move forward guidelines change again and we come to a halt and back to square one

So please tell me why you think I and many many of my colleagues in similar situations are failing the public because we not constantly reporting to our unions (they certainly aware don’t worry I get plenty of updates) or we are at fault because the press wants to big up be nhs (I’m well aware how quickly that turned sour look at the threads on here about nhs discounts 🙄)

It's disgusting and I've been failed miserably, along with every single women suffering with endometriosis as the NHS deem this to be elective surgery.

The disease is hideously painful, most of the women I know are taking morphine daily to get through with 18 month waits, as it's a benign cancer and impacts women the GPS have resorted to giving cancer drugs to bring on menopause to stop the cycles of pain, causing long term damage to thousands of women and their fertility.

The whole treatment of women 1 in 10 is foul it was before COVID and now it's critical, there are more women suffering with this than peopek with Diabetes or dementia but yet as it's a woman's issue it's just ignored, most of these women have waited and suffered for average 7 years for a diagnosis and then to have the surgery cancelled is just crazy.

So yes failed along with 1 in 10 other women in this backwards country.

I can't even begin to imagine the suffering of cancer patients as that is also a massively worrying disease and has so many reasons why it should be treated quickly.

I hope you are able to find the energy to shout an yell as a recent trip to a&e taught me the men come in yelling and shouting the women sit and suffer, and the men get seen to first, so my tactic, make an absolute pain of yourself!!

I'm very very lucky and managed to pay to go privately during lockdown to the tune of 6k but I'd say there are not many about to do this, we now have a loan but for the fact I saw a surgeon I'm so so grateful for that loan.

Sadly I heard from few medical professionals that this is how it will be from now on.
No face to face appointments, only over phone or video.
I’m absolutely shocked.
It’s like we are going back to 17th century.
Very basic care.
I bet this is all what it was about, to reduce numbers of patients.
My Gp surgery is completely boarded up- walked past it yesterday.
Shocking really.

I am not a teacher.

And of course I don't know the reasons why because not many people in the NHS are talking about it. And when people do, from some it's well what do you expect us to do about it?

You've read the thread, nhs staff claiming that everything is open when it clearly isn't. Implications that patients aren't being proactive enough to get seen like they urgently need.

I didn't read the discount thread. NHS along with a lot of public sector workers get discounts. Not exclusive to public sector workers either, depends on the company you work for. Its been around for years. 20 years ago in the private sector, one of the perks was gym discount and these could/can be done without the salary sacrifice. (not sure how I'm not an accountant or work for the tax office).

I'm frustrated of course I am. 5 months so far and no end in site and the departments needed aren't open. One of my consultants has popped in several times, no-one there and no explanation. The wards aren't full, haven't been since May.

With the two week rotation and regular testing the rate of staff transmission has almost disappeared, and of course getting it to zero is unrealistic. It's how they managed to keep the wards open when they were at breaking point just like many hospitals across the country.

@Hiddennameforever. unfortunately so have I. And for some reason it's often accompanied by the words next year.

I don't know about others. If this is the case I want to know now.

I want to know why I will have to carry on with calls/video but I can go for a pint.

Why do those get special consideration and protection yet other nhs are in the frontline of it? Are there really such high numbers of those shielding working in the NHS that close whole departments down? If this is really the case then what is being done about this both at NHS and Government level to prevent it happening again?

I’ve had nothing short of exceptional service from the NHS. I developed a problem over lockdown with my health. Called my GP surgery at 3.30pm on a friday, I was called back at 3.50pm by the GP. Wanted to examine, so was in his office by 4.20om. Referred to a neurologist at my local hospital. Appt came through and I had a consultation with the neurologist within 10 days. Private health cover could not have offered me a quicker service.

That was standard service here before CV for nhs. We didn't even have the usual gp hold-up for gynae referral. They would even call and see how things were going etc. Have done all the way through, just they are stuck without answers.

Years ago when nhs was really bad, and whole wards did get closed due to underfunding, within 10 days I had a smear and surgery booked. Rather than finding out elsewhere the gp contacted me personally. Let me know what help and support was there how to access it. The surgery was on the brink of closure and we had a petition and that to prevent it from happening which was thankfully successful.

If we remain silent, if we don't ask questions then how do people become aware of these serious issues? To get proper attention we need to be talking about it more.