To expect relatives to be safe in hospital...

[MariaAngustias]

Just had a phone call to say that my Aunt has died of coronavirus - she was admitted with something else and caught it in hospital. I am just really angry that this happened to her - why are people catching covid in our hospitals where they should be safe? I keep hearing this and it is just disgusting. How can this be happening?

Because people can pass it on while being asymptomatic and masks, while helpful, are not 100% barriers against transmission. People touch their faces etc without thinking, even HCPs.
I'm so sorry for your loss.

I am so sorry for your loss.

I would say a hospital is the least safe environment in almost every respect. Both of us have been injured in hospital. DH in a permanent and life altering way.

Because that's where the sick people go...

Sorry about your loss.

So sorry for your loss. That's why the NHS trusts so hard to keep Pepe out of hospital/discharge them as early as possible as sadly, hospital is the worse place to be to avoid catching things.

A close relative caught it in hospital and died. He may have caught it from an asymptomatic member of staff (he wasn’t on a Covid ward initially) but I do question a system which feels the need to test patients coming in to hospital but then doesn’t wait to find out the results before putting them in a 4 bed room with patients known to be negative (resulting in him being exposed to 3 positive patients).

I won’t be complaining as he no longer wanted to be alive (he was old and frail), but I have considered writing to the hospital to suggest how rubbish their procedures were.

Patients come into contact with so many people when in hospital.
In the course of one day for example, 2 HCAs, a Nurse, a Phlebotomist, 2 Physios an Occupational Therapist, 2 Doctors, a Consultant. 2 Housekeepers, 2 Food Service assistants. Maybe a Porter, Radiologist and two assistants. Someone else’s visitor who kindly passes them something. Plus different shift of night staff.
Despite hand washing, gloves, aprons, masks, virus can still spread.

I won't be complaining either, totally understand pressures on NHS but just feel let down - they have PPE and infection control procedures which clearly are not working.

Yes @HollysBush and also let's not forget that it's only the staff wearing masks. Patients understandably are too sick to be wearing masks 24 hours a day but if one patient in a bay becomes positive the all the staff PPE in the world won't help the other patients who have been exposed.

I do understand that frustration @MariaAngustias and I am very sorry for your loss but this is an airborne respiratory virus so we can only do our best.

Also a negative test on admission doesn't always mean that the person won't go on to develop symptoms

<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/29/getting-tested-for-covid-19-need-to-know&ved=2ahUKEwiLzvySqLntAhXDolwKHcYLBDYQFjALegQIBxAB&usg=AOvVaw1uD2IKV75WGytEQObYNxj8&ampcf=1" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/29/getting-tested-for-covid-19-need-to-know&ved=2ahUKEwiLzvySqLntAhXDolwKHcYLBDYQFjALegQIBxAB&usg=AOvVaw1uD2IKV75WGytEQObYNxj8&ampcf=1

Sorry for your loss. That’s very sad.

A test only really covers you for the day. I see it like an MOT, a bit could fall off your car round the corner from the test centre afterwards but you have your MOT pass certificate so you think you’re ok for the foreseeable. Just like you get your once a week (or whatever) negative and think you’re fine for the whole week.

You don’t know who is incubating a virus. And they don’t know either.

We’d all need tested every day with results in under an hour so we can isolate while awaiting them and then go to work once we are shown the test is negative.

I don’t see that happening. It would need to be like a home testing and lab set up. Like diabetics can do with bloods to quickly see the current situation within their body at home quickly and easily.

This corona virus is just dreadful.

2 major issues.

Cleaning uniforms used to be done by hospital on boil wash with proper detergent. Now it's left in staff hands. Not every staff member will clean those uniforms properly.

2 cleaning was also out sourced and is not under the direct control of the ward.
My two over night stays saw utterly filthy sides by windows.. Never touched, filthy floors, the weakest most lack lustre pushing of a mop and chatting by cleaning staff.
The same chip that was there on arrival under our bed, was there when we left.
It was pathetic. If I had been in charge I would have played merry hell.
Then there are all the secondary workers, porters, admin, reception, kitchen as well as cleaners, whether they get properly inducted into the importance of pathogen control, I do not know!

I know of three people who contracted it in hospital.
Two were elderly and had underlying health problems, and both died.
One is younger with underlying health problems and has been in hospital for several weeks. They can’t get her usual problems under control while she’s got Covid.

I'm sorry for your loss.

Agree with PP it's bizarre that they test patients when being admitted but they then get put in a ward with other patients before the results come back. The staff at my hospital are doing 2 tests a week and the results come back in 30 mins but for patients you have to wait a few days.

I was admitted to hospital last week and a HCA told me how a male patient on the ward was going up to everyone's beds asking if they had a phone charger and going up to staff too, all whilst not wearing a mask, he then had a positive result come back - after going up to the bedside of lots of sick people. They had to shut the entire ward to clean it and send all the patients to a different ward.

They'd only just introduced the rule that you have to wear a face mask when walking around the ward or to go to the toilet a week before I was admitted! Absolutely shocking.

And you can also see how easily it can spread when being seen by so many different staff.

In my 3 night stay I was seen by 7 different nurses, a consultant, specialist nurse, 4 HCAs, 2 different cleaners coming up to my bedside and a registrar. That's 16 different people coming within 2 metres of me in 3 nights/4 days.

My Godmother had been in a care home for twelve years due to Alzheimer’s and she caught COVID in the home and died.

My Auntie was in hospital following a stroke during the first lockdown and contracted COVID in the hospital and died from it.

It’s really, really sad.

Hospitals are the worst place for catching covid.

But hospitals have always been unsafe. They are a breeding ground for MRSA.

That being said. My friends elderly dad was in hospital because of a water infection and the nurses dropped him taking him to the toilet and he broke his neck and died shortly afterwards.

Hospitals have never been safe places.