Hospital staff, tell us the reality

[Ihateme]

I’m am so fed up of seeing people comment on here that schools should be going back, that people should not be reporting mass gatherings in tier 4, how dare people begrudge a child their birthday party etc...

The hospitals are in a worse state now than they were during the first peak. Would any doctors or nurses care to confirm this? Maybe then these Mumsnetters will get the message.

@missyB1

Lougle it’s very patronising of you to insinuate that joe public can’t cope with the truth and therefore it should be hidden from them. The NHS belongs to all of us and we all have a right to know the state of it. Yes it’s scary to be a patient or to have a relative in hospital, but that fear could be put to good use to campaign for better staffing and better funding for our NHS.

I don’t want to be tested like a pleb who has the truth hidden from them.

That's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that internal emails should not be published, in my opinion.

I agree.

Johnson, in his bid to be people-pleaser, has not locked down strictly or quickly enough, over and over again. He was advised by all the main scientific advisors to lockdown at the end of last September, for 3 weeks over the half term break. This would have prevented us being where we are right now and probably prevented the virus mutation to take hold like it has.

I couldn't agree more. It is shameful to think of all the travel and mixing that went on throughout the autumn. But really, the chance was lost in the Spring. As we've seen, when there's a disaster, the public pulls together brilliantly - but only briefly. Normally, briefly is fine (e.g. after a terrorist attack). But not this year. If we'd had a proper hard lock, internal and external borders closed etc in the Spring a la Australia, we might have been okay.

And to the front line workers - I have so much respect for you all, working not just under these conditions but knowing how much of the public is acting right now. I will keep following the rules and sharing your stories with friends that seem to think Covid is 'over' in the hope that it gets through.

@doublehelix

At my hospital there are emails asking us all to volunteer to do a day or two of basic nursing care on the adult wards after an hour of training (I'm a consultant in Paeds)

So many staff off and numbers of patients rising at a scary rate.

This really needs saying again as the I formatting isn’t getting out there to the public who are just partying away because of their “rights”

@haggistramp

I dont understand the hospital shortages, aren't people being sent to the nightingale hospitals if they have covid, wasn't this the point of them. Are they even up and running? I heard a lot of hoo ha earlier in the year about the nightingale hospitals and then nothing more.

It’s a staffing issue. Hospital staff are looking after covid patients with just surgical masks and not full PPE as recommended by WHO. The U.K. government decided on its own that surgical masks were fine. Staff are dropping like flies because of this. Minimum 10 days off for everyone and then 20% long covid means a lot aren’t coming back.

So you can’t staff a regular hospital and there is no magic staff to safely staff the nightingale.

Hospitals are putting out alerts saying “if your relative is medcaikly fit for discharge and just waiting for care, please take them home and care for them” To free up bed spades and to stop them sadly getting covid in the hospital.

Other countries would do this more readily U.K. won’t.

Also stop campaigning to be allowed into care homes. Have you not seen how one positive person kills the entire population of one off just so you can have a hug?

That's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that internal emails should not be published, in my opinion.

Its evidence. The fact its official is the point that should be rammed home. Its what gives it strength and a sense of the urgency and importance of the situation.

Or should we should bury evidence? And rely on hearsay from staff instead which people will simply seize upon and use as a way of denying its real because its 'not properly sourced'?

I'm sorry you don't get it and I'm sorry you are so naive. But you are categorically wrong on this being its such a disaster and it needs to be visible.

Its in the public interest for us to know about this and for this to be seen.

The nightingales 😂

Got to laugh or I'll cry. Great fucking Britain even put on a NYE light show featuring the useless, pointless nightingales that we can't and never could staff, for all the world to see.

Embarrassing

The uk has less funding per head of population for healthcare than many other european countries - notably the ones we look up to.

We have less beds per head of population. We have less ICU beds per head of population.

Because we have this lack of winter capacity we've historically had problems in hospitals for years.

We knew there was not enough staff for the nightingales. We knew there wasn't the staff to cope. We knew many were going off sick with PTSD.

The hospitalisation rate of covid is something like 10 times that of seasonal flu.

We therefore had less room to open up in the autumn. We opened up more than many other countries.

Our government thought they could ignore scientists warning about the rate of exponential growth (which is not that hard to project if you have the right parameters).

None of this should be surprising to anyone. The fact it is is the shocking bit.

Thats the scandal.

Not publishing a fucking internal email spelling the consequences of this out.

RedToothBrush Agreed. What a bloody shitshow.

MH nurse. I work in community with older people. Still doing visits, all in PPE, despite rumours that all MH services are closed.

My personal caseload has gone up 40% and is over our service limit + we have a wait list. At management meetings I'm being asked to free up staff to cover the wards / possibly vaccinate (not until mid jan at earliest) but I cannot spare anyone. The wards are really really struggling due to staff sickness / isolation but community referrals are going up and up too.

Number of deaths on my caseload in the past 12 months has been horrific and I have spent a lot of time with families who couldn't spend the time they wanted with loved ones in hospital/ care homes trying to work through guilt, anger and such awful loneliness. This will be a huge ongoing thing and I hope staff will get good access to support too.

It is dawning on me that even if I do not catch Covid at all.. the pandemic is at best going to see me disabled to a point where I have no independence or ability to work for myself.

My ops to fix/halt nerve damage were cancelled due to covid.

As a result my mobility has dropped by around 50% in total and probably 80% of my 'use of my own arms'.

My pain levels are sky high most days, I don't sleep for more than an hour, I scream and cry regularly as a result of pain, multiple times a day from subluxations that trap nerves and ligaments and render limbs useless.

I have a bunch of other conditions which would normally be monitored in person at regular consultant appointments that I now get telephone appointments for, so no one has a clue what my heart is actually like now and despite being on a list to have another 24 hour monitor that hasn't happened yet.

I live in an inaccessible house, I haven't showered since march due to the changes in my mobility, I now need much more personal care which is pretty unpleasant. I won't get help with this in a time frame that actually helps me, it was a lengthy wait before covid for DFG funded adaptations, its not happening at all now.

The reality is that by the time anyone can see me and do anything, it'll be too late for me.

And in general the feeling is that this is ok because I am disabled and the disabled and old and vulnerable are an acceptable price to pay, we are disposable, we do not matter.

And despite all THAT... I STILL feel pretty fucking lucky that I do not have to work in a hospital, that I do not HAVE to go outside, I don't have to deal first hand with people dying of covid, or even second or third hand.

But I do feel like most of the country is wholly unaware of the indirect disability and death that covid is causing.

Oh my goodness @WiddlinDiddlin

It is astounding how much some have lost due to covid being out of control.

I should have sent flowers too for you

I'm so sorry you are suffering both the pain and the physical problems.

What would you think if a nurse commented and said that it is not how it is being portrayed on mainstream media?
Would you automatically say that they are lying?

@Timbucktime

What would you think if a nurse commented and said that it is not how it is being portrayed on mainstream media? Would you automatically say that they are lying?

I look for balance of evidence from a range of sources. And the quality / realibility of those sources.

This is not rocket science.

Everyone shouting that schools should stay open should read this thread. I'm a pastoral lead in a medium sized SE secondary in an area not badly affected until now.
Despite our relatively low case rate until now, I have supported 4 students who have lost parents (3 to covid, 1 because chemo was postponed due to covid), many more who have lost grandparents, 2 colleagues who have lost husband/wife, 1 colleague who lost her child - only in his 30s, and 1 of my colleagues has died.
This is what is trashing the kids' mental health - the loss of loved ones, the fear of taking it home, the fear for parents working in the NHS, the collapse of the NHS and the instability of repeated unplanned isolation. A month or so of planned online learning with hubs for key workers and vulnerable? Really pales in comparison doesn't it. We need a lockdown, we can't carry on like this with rising cases.

A nurse friend works on a respiratory ward in the SE (not London). Apparently it’s utter madness. She says they’re all bracing for it to get worse in about 3-4 weeks when the impact of the new term kicks in, and for it to spread further geographically.

That’s only a second hand account though, you’re best looking on Twitter for reputable NHS staff accounts.

@SchrodingersUnicorn

Everyone shouting that schools should stay open should read this thread. I'm a pastoral lead in a medium sized SE secondary in an area not badly affected until now. Despite our relatively low case rate until now, I have supported 4 students who have lost parents (3 to covid, 1 because chemo was postponed due to covid), many more who have lost grandparents, 2 colleagues who have lost husband/wife, 1 colleague who lost her child - only in his 30s, and 1 of my colleagues has died. This is what is trashing the kids' mental health - the loss of loved ones, the fear of taking it home, the fear for parents working in the NHS, the collapse of the NHS and the instability of repeated unplanned isolation. A month or so of planned online learning with hubs for key workers and vulnerable? Really pales in comparison doesn't it. We need a lockdown, we can't carry on like this with rising cases.

I do note that one over looked area is the mental health impact on kids being sent to school when cases are so high.

Kids who may well realise that they could infect their parents.

This isn't on the radar and being considered. Its just ignored.

Exactly Red wmy dd with ASD feels terrible thst she passed it on to me (I've been mainly shielding this yr). If I were taken into hodputsl or worse she woukd be in a terrible state.

She's not been anywhere seen anyone apart from going to school. A lot of people are being infected via schools who are following all the rules - like us.

You make a great point Red

My son attends a secondary school with lots of cases - around 20% in his form alone. He caught Covid at school.

He had 6 isolations and no more than 10 days in school continuously.

It became a daily routine for kids and parents to speculate if they would be sent home. There was little stability and with so many cases, everybody was nervous.

We had two false alarms on top of the six isolations. One day when they were sent home, but then told it was a mistake and they could go in the next day.

The next time sent home, a call the next morning to say it was a mistake and that they could go in that afternoon or the next day. My son chose the afternoon. If only he'd chosen the flowing day, he wouldn't have been subjected to a 6th isolation up to Xmas (he'd already had Covid at that point).

My son thinks this is now the norm. To go into school and wonder if you'll last the day. For parents to be called. To arrive at school and wait in reception because of another case.

He's year 10, so as much as I'd like him in school, it's so damaging all this last minute yo-yoing and unsettling for us all.

Ime pupils are far more anxious about being in school in these conditions than they were in the summer term for planned online learning.

Hospital numbers are going to be totally different depending on where you live. Of course hospitals will be fuller if you live in densely populated areas

I work in community nursing and have so far had no one on our caseload with covid unless they were totally asymptomatic of course . My local hospital in a rural area of Scotland has 14 suspected cases and less than 5 in ICU and we are now a hotspot due to this more transmissible strain, will be interested to see if it equates to more in hospital or whether the numbers will remain stable as they have done since March

And Red we are in late 40s, so not vulnerable, but we cannot see my mother because of all the cases and my poor son feels bad about this.

@SchrodingersUnicorn

Ime pupils are far more anxious about being in school in these conditions than they were in the summer term for planned online learning.

Couldn't agree more!

Something I heard yesterday was that two qualified nurses, one a former A&E sister, one a former theatre nurse, sisters. I have known one of the sisters for 15 years so I don't doubt the veracity of the information. Both volunteered in April, both were happy to work for band 4/5 pay appreciating hospitals needed to have them on their payrolls due to indemnity/registration issues. Both have school aged children and offered their services between 9am and 4pm. Both were told they could only be offered work of 12 hour shifts. Neither could do that.

The inflexibility of the system beggars belief and if two extra pairs of qualified hands for some of the time were turned away, then regrettably my sympathy starts to wane and essential questions around bureaucracy and "computer says" really must be asked and asked on rinse and repeat. There were also the retired GPS who couldn't be taken on due to not having completed their Prevent training and therefore were sans the CPD certificate. As a citizen I couldn't give a flying fuck about completion of Prevent training and E&D training - the latter of which appears pointless anyway from what I have observed at NHS hospital appointments.

Nevertheless I am sorry that existing staff are suffering additional burdens due to gross bureaucracy and a lack of common sense.