To be shocked at infection control at hospital

[Trumpety]

So I had to visit A&E this morning. AIBU to be shocked at lack of infection control?

1. No masks or hand sanitiser available as you walk in. Just a sign asking you to wear a mask or ask at reception if you don’t have one

1. No sanitiser available anywhere in the A&E reception / waiting area. I went looking for some as I didn’t want to go rifling through my bag to find mine - I could only find a single empty bottle

1. No one checking temperature on the way in. I didn’t have my temp checked until I saw the triage nurse after about 10min

1. Signs up at the X-Ray reception saying “please remove your mask so our receptionists can understand you properly”!

1. “Red” area and “green” area at X-ray separated by a divider

1. Still no sanitiser available anywhere in X-Ray

I’ve known 3 people to contract CV19 in hospital and I completely understand why now

At our local hospital, reception are letting people in too early for appointments , they are letting people attend with other people when there is no specific need and property services have let out rooms to a different trust too close to other clinics when there is space at the other end of the hospital. There have been far too many people in a small space .

@jessycake

At our local hospital, reception are letting people in too early for appointments , they are letting people attend with other people when there is no specific need and property services have let out rooms to a different trust too close to other clinics when there is space at the other end of the hospital. There have been far too many people in a small space .

Same with our hospital. You walk past loads of empty rooms and empty waiting areas and when you finally get to the out patients dept, it's absolutely heaving with people. We went to see OH's oncologist and were stuck in a tiny cramped waiting area with dozens of other people. Some were waiting for blood tests, some waiting for one of the 2 oncologists, some waiting for the cardiac consultant. All four of them in a "cluster" of rooms. Yet, the next "cluster" of consulting rooms just down the corridor, was completely empty. Makes no sense at all to have everything concentrated in a tiny area when they had virtually an entire floor empty and cordoned off.

Having had a couple of overnight stays in hospital in the last year in general wards I concur that infection control was a bit of a joke. No washing hands or even sanitising or changing gloves between blood pressure checks or consultant checks on the ward, thermometer was in the mouth then merely dipped in something between patients which seemed weirdly old fashioned, people sent up to the ward who then transpired hadn't had their covid test but left there anyway until they'd had it and when I had a CT scan the hand sanitiser was empty and the dispenser filthy. And then there was someone on the ward who it transpired DID have covid after all and they were left there for a couple of hours longer presumably until they could find a porter. Staff were nice, treatment was great, but it really was all a bit grotty tbh. Between patients, empty cubicles were swept and bedding changed but nothing else, no mopping or wiping down, as far as I could see.

My sister trained as a nurse. She said that infection control teaching was all about blood (it was in the 80s- Aids/HIV era). If it wasn't red, they weren't interested. I suspect that mentality has endured to the present day with a kind of "if you can't see it, it doesn't matter" attitude.

Why didn't you want to go rifling through your bag for your hand sanitiser? You had some but chose not to use it.

You had hand sanitizer and chose not to use it - I kind of lost interest at that point.

I went for an X-Ray a few weeks ago. Went in through a revolving door so touched nothing. Sat on a chair which touched only my clothes. Walked into x ray without touching anything and put the hand being tested on a sheet of paper which was then thrown away. I wore my own mask, just like everyone else.

There was no need for masks and hand sanitizer to be supplied.

@user1497207191

My sister trained as a nurse. She said that infection control teaching was all about blood (it was in the 80s- Aids/HIV era). If it wasn't red, they weren't interested. I suspect that mentality has endured to the present day with a kind of "if you can't see it, it doesn't matter" attitude.

Definitely not the case. Original infection control may have been about that but we are updated annually including a specific Covid infection control session this year.

Why didnt you want to "rifle through your own bag"?

After a 7 night stay on a hospital ward I found out they were supposed to have given me a covid test on day 1, day 3 then weekly after that but they forgot until day 3. Luckily was negative but they assumed the first ward before surgery had done it.

Why couldn't you use your own sanitizer that you had with you in your handbag?

Not really fair to say a whole hospital of staff don't care now they've had the vaccine just because the 1 day you came in the sanitizer and masks had run out.

The fact that you wandered round looking for sanitizer rather than using your own isn't very infection control savvy either.

The hospital might very well be below par but your insinuations about staff sucks.

Our hospital built a new handwashing station in the foyer with a mask dispenser and there are dispensers of sanitizer every few metres. The doors also are now almost all automatic.

People in hospitals have been working really hard over the last year and to dismiss them as selfishly uncaring since they've had a vaccine and the sanitizer was empty is just pathetic.

To all the posters asking, I absolutely did use my own sanitiser. I just didn’t want to rifle through my bag with my germy hands that I had just used to open doors etc, when I saw what A&E was like. Ive since disinfected everything in my bag

I worked with this awful doctor once I was hoping him remove a man's catheter which was stuck. He yanked it out and slung it on the radiator that was by the bed and get rid of that will you.....slime and blood dripping down the radiator. I took a photo and sent it to the hospital manager. I never did see that junior doctor again. There were quite a few similar complaints apparently.

You had hand sanitizer in your bag but didn't want to use it?!

Experienced similar no soap in the toilets. Let staff know and I was waiting five hours so needed to go again, still no soap in both lots of toilets on that floor. I understand the busy thing but it is important to have soap in the toilets. I’ll be bringing my own in future in case!

No windows open in any I've been in recently

Single most powerful thing we can do with airborne disease. Florence nightingale...
Jumped on for thermometer... But no fresh air.. Xoeeidies

@SpringisSpinning

No windows open in any I've been in recently

Single most powerful thing we can do with airborne disease. Florence nightingale...
Jumped on for thermometer... But no fresh air.. Xoeeidies

That will be either because they don't open for H&S or the patients complain they are cold.