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.

@the80saregreat - he was interviewed by radio 4 about it last week (I don't think this has blown my anonymity as I have just tried to find the segment on catch-up using his actual name and I can't!). Lots of shouting going on. One of the most frustrating things is the unevenness of vaccine provision by postcode e.g. his practice is in a different county to the one we live in. Folks in our home county have been receiving vaccines for several days now, people in his practice catchment obviously haven't ... yet his practice is in an area with a higher rate of infection, more deprivation etc.

Between our 2 small hospitals we have over 100 Covid inpatients. 2 weeks ago it was under 60. Both hospitals have had to cancel elective surgery to turn theatres into a second ITU. We're in a tier two area. I have friends working in hospitals in the NW, NE, SW, London...the shit is truly hitting the fan.

Sorry, I don't mean that he actually shouted on Radio 4. That makes him sound rude. I mean lots of figurative shouting to people in power to try and get things accelerated.

My cousin is a nurse and says morale is very low. Staffing is a big problem which is exacerbated by useless track and trace. She is off work at the moment as she has been told to isolate but the contact with covid apparently happened ten days ago (only notified 7 days later) so isolating is pretty useless now - and she has had a negative test since. Without efficient track and trace, it all seems rather pointless.

It's like calling wolf. They are just making excuses for another lockdown. Which is their answer to problems caused by putting Lodon in Tier 2 and allowing mixing at Christmas. Too boring.

Paramedics were called to my father this morning who has covid.

Our local hospital has a 5 hour wait for handover from ambulance to A&E. that's 5 hours an ambulance and it's crew are held up unable to help other people

My friend works in the same hospital, she currently has 1/3 of her usual nursing staff available due to covid/isolation and the wards are full and getting fuller - more patients with less staff is always going to be a recipe for disaster isn't it 😩

The army is offering to help secondary schools. I wonder could they be redeployed as helpers in hospital? Obviously not medical care unless trained, but as an extra pair of hands freeing up nurses and hcas? I would volunteer if I didn't work full time and didn't have children to look after. But perhaps the red tape would be too prohibitive at this stage?

But different areas will have different answers and different hospitals so you will get a mixed response

Plus you can search for the data online for all areas if you want to know this is how I keep an eye on whats happening in my area as this is what is likely to affect me the most

Are in-patient numbers possibly higher than April because hospitals are accepting less critically ill covid patients this time around?
Lots of stories and personal accounts of very unwell people refused entry into hospital because they weren’t blue enough back in April and also sadly lots of elderly people in their own homes or care homes left for nature to take its course because of their age and chances of survival. Seems this time around people are getting treatment much earlier and the scandal of the care homes is not being repeated. Not saying this is the only reason but suggesting it could be a factor.

South Wales hospital here. Staff are at absolute breaking point. There are not enough beds, not enough staff and morale has upped and gone for good.
Nothing else I can say really.

I've name changed for this.
I work in a small 40 bed rehab unit.
We treat mainly elderly frail patients, recovering from hip replacements, that kind of thing.
We are meant to be a covid free area but over the last couple of weeks, have had a fair amount of cases.
We struggle to get them admitted as the larger hospitals are too full to find space, yet every hour they remain in our care they present a risk to our other patients.
We do not have the skill to treat such acutely ill people.
It is tragic and I wanted to scream at the two men ahead of me today at the petrol station, one loudly coughing and neither wearing masks.
People aren't getting it, it's not "just" the elderly dying. It's your brother, sister, husband who won't get a hospital bed if they have a heart attack.

@Viviennemary oh dear, we wouldn't want you to be bored eh?

The army is offering to help secondary schools

The army aren’t offering to help, they’re being told to help. DS1 is a soldier and one of the most frustrating things for him during lockdown in March was speaking to DS2 and hearing about him not having adequate PPE etc, while he was sitting in his room in barracks, going for a run, doing PT etc when he could’ve been driving white fleet round the country distributing masks etc.

The Govt have failed miserably from all angles when it comes to the handling of the Covid crisis. It’s shocking what they’ve been allocated to get away with.

@chloworm

The army is offering to help secondary schools. I wonder could they be redeployed as helpers in hospital? Obviously not medical care unless trained, but as an extra pair of hands freeing up nurses and hcas? I would volunteer if I didn't work full time and didn't have children to look after. But perhaps the red tape would be too prohibitive at this stage?

Only by phone or by zoom calls not real hands on help

@TheFairyCaravan

The army is offering to help secondary schools

The army aren’t offering to help, they’re being told to help. DS1 is a soldier and one of the most frustrating things for him during lockdown in March was speaking to DS2 and hearing about him not having adequate PPE etc, while he was sitting in his room in barracks, going for a run, doing PT etc when he could’ve been driving white fleet round the country distributing masks etc.

The Govt have failed miserably from all angles when it comes to the handling of the Covid crisis. It’s shocking what they’ve been allocated to get away with.

This !! The forces have been criminally underused. The skills they have are incredible. Not surprising that your son is itching to help.

Posted on Facebook by a friend who is a paediatric lung specialist. It’s more focused on encouraging people to get the vaccine but does share some of the grim reality in hospitals at the moment.

@TheFairyCaravan

The army is offering to help secondary schools

The army aren’t offering to help, they’re being told to help. DS1 is a soldier and one of the most frustrating things for him during lockdown in March was speaking to DS2 and hearing about him not having adequate PPE etc, while he was sitting in his room in barracks, going for a run, doing PT etc when he could’ve been driving white fleet round the country distributing masks etc.

The Govt have failed miserably from all angles when it comes to the handling of the Covid crisis. It’s shocking what they’ve been allocated to get away with.

So yes perhaps they could help then? The problem with other volunteers is that most fit and healthy (therefore less vulnerable) people are working already or caring for children. Maybe big companies should give employees time off to volunteer? Unlikely I know.

I think a lot of people don’t recognise the position that hospitals are in because they don’t think that these figures need to concern them as they’re unlikely to go into hospital. So to them it’s happening “to someone else.” Iyswim.

As for disputing that people are dying from covid, fact is that if you have an underlying health condition then COVID will trigger that condition which, if you didn’t have COVID, wouldn’t necessarily have happened. E.g. if I catch COVID I am likely to die from heart failure as I am currently in heart failure, but as my health has been relatively stable recently it will be the COVID that has caused it, and hence it will be necessary to add COVID to my death certificate.

I saw the heart failure nurse in August and she said then that they’d all been drafted down to ICU especially the nurses as they have understanding of the procedures and equipment etc as most of the cardiac nurses did their foundation training in ICU. That was in August when things we’re looking up a bit more. Now I’m guessing they’ll all be back there.

In the meantime I haven’t had a heart echo since August 2019 and I haven’t had my ICD check since November of the same year. My May one was cancelled and wasn’t re-scheduled until March next year, but given how the figures are now going it seems unlikely that will go ahead. So either it’s working and pacing when it has to, or it’s not but it’s ok because my heart is behaving.

And I was meant to have a checkup with the transplant service at Papworth which hasn’t happened, despite the fact I was told a year ago I had a year maximum before my health deteriorated to the point I would need to be assessed and put on the transplant list. Fortunately I haven’t regressed and have done absolutely everything they asked, fluid restrictions/limiting salt/other additives etc which I am hoping is the key to staying off the list for now.

I actually have supreme confidence in my medical teams, but that isn’t going to get me anywhere if they’re not available due to the hospital being over-stretched and under-staffed.

@Kidsaregrim if you can pm me the name of your hospital where expensive Pfizer vaccines are being thrown away rather than given to staff I shall be delighted to write on your behalf to your MP.

I am sorry hcps find themselves not feeling supported but please listen to these examples. Where I live all admin staff at the MH Trust have been wfh since March and along with rafts of clinicians will.continue to do so until sd stops. In August and September here there were 8 cases per 100,000. Teachers went back to work along and supermarket staff along with emergency services never stopped. DD had an apt in September, by phone and was told to be available from 9am until 7pm. The website is unclear and out of date.

OTH she has had a very efficient gynae referral and our GP has improved tenfold since it went on-line but regrettably this is not evident across rafts of the NHS. And like the idiots throwing away expensive vaccine that could easily be utilised, parts of it deserve zero gratitude.

Please Kidaregrim do let me know your Trust because you manager and the CEO deserve, if not to be lynched, at least to beg not to be.

@chloworm they’ve helped in testing centres and with the building of the Nightingale Hospitals but until the Govt and top bods get together and tell them to do more they just can’t. There’s no joined up thinking between the Govt departments imo.

Trainee paramedics being asked to come in whilst on annual leave. Trainees - a few months into training.

21 of 35 clinicians in my ward off work atm with either confirmed COVID or needing to self isolate. We are basically fucked.

@Trollsinthedungeon

My work is sending people home but only because we do cardiac surgery and covid patients are now in our cardiac icu so we can't do the surgery as there are no beds. We are licensed for 5 ecmo patients at one time by nhs England but we have 45 now so that's going to be a mental bill to pay. Weird one of six ecmo centres in the uk and we've been taking patients from Scotland and down south for a few weeks now.

We're lucky though in that we have a lot of ecmo machines and the staff who are trained to deal with them so we can literally make bays and bays of ecmo patients

"A mental bill to pay" do you mean you get fined for taking more patients?

If so... fucking hell that is screwed up! Possibly ok under normal circumstances to stick to guidelines, but at the moment??? Wow!

@Kizziebel and @Trollsinthedungeon thank you for taking the time to reply to my questions. I hope I and my family and friends never need your care and expertise.

I work in a completely different area of the NHS, which has it's own challenges at the moment, but I cannot even to begin to imagine how difficult things are for you and your colleagues in ICU/HDU and on the wards. You are all bloody amazing