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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Why are some NHS staff unkept looking?

400 replies

BoozySuzie · 29/01/2008 17:33

I don't visit hospitals often thank goodness but I can't help but notice a lot of staff in hospitals are quite scruffy. Surely working in a hospital environment it is imperitive to be spotlessly clean and well groomed?? The Philipino nurses always look clean and tidy it's just our staff.

OP posts:
LaDiDaDi · 30/01/2008 08:31

I'm a hospital doctor and I'm sure that at times I look scruffy, like this morning after a 13 hour night shift.

Sometimes it is bloody hard to get the chance to eat or go to the loo. I can easily see how people can become overweight when working as doctors or nurses; you haven't eaten from breakfast at 7.30 to "lunch" at 3pm. You are starvingly hungry as you have been on your feet for hours. You have about 10 minutes to eat and you don't know when you will get the chance to eat again but probably not until you get home at 10.30pm. Do you slowly eat a healthy salad savouring every mouthful and stopping as soon as you feel full or do you stuff a sandwich and a flapjack in your mouth consuming about 1000 calories in one meal?

millie70 · 30/01/2008 09:32

If working in the NHS is that bad then why do it??? I think some people are exagerating big time, i.e Anne. My SIL is a nurse and has laughed at some of Annes comments- she really is being over the top . Oh, and SIL works in ICU and always manages a break and looks clean and presentable.

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 09:43

ok well just to warn you i have now been up for 27.5 hrs with zero sleep and im very tired and very grouchy and i have no tether left

HOW DARE YOU op!

(cant be arsed to read past first 20 posts)

yes after 27.5 hrs i look scruffy. my uniform is made of shit polyester
i have been emptying catheter bags full of piss and blood for the best part of 13 hrs
i have been turning patients in bed to wipe them clean them, move them up the bed, get them on the commode, get them in the bath etc
i have been running about for 13 hrs and i got 20mins for my break. during this time i had to help a patient who had pulled his venflon out and blood was everywhere. i get to use a cheap as fucking chips thin as fuck apron to do this. woopdedoo!

would you like me to go on? shall i tell you about the man who was admitted and hadnt had a bath for a year (probably) as he is a tramp? and guess hwo had to bath him?

or shall i tell you about the man who arrived back from theatre and his would de-hissed?

yes i look like shit. i havent had any sleep.

havent you got anything better to do than critisise other people

Surfermum · 30/01/2008 09:46

Maybe your SIL works in a Trust that is well managed millie. Just because it isn't your SIL's experience it doesn't mean it isn't someone else's.

nervousal · 30/01/2008 09:47

Don't know if this has been mentioned - but what on earth has a nurses pay got to do with how she looks?? Its not as if she/he has to buy their uniform???

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 09:49

if anyone had the nerve to call me unkempt after a shift at work theyd soon bloody regret it is all i can say

(not getting involved in rest of argument)

id like an apology please boozysuzie

what do you do anyway? work in an office and straighten your hair/chew gum all day? hmmm?

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 09:57

I suspect at the end of a 12 hour shift cleaning up all manner of unspeakable stuff and caring for countless patients, overstretched nursing/clinical staff are bound to look a little rougher round the edges than they did at the start of their shift.

Ah, I see that in the time it has taken me to read this thread naily has penned a much more pithy response.

BTW, I work in the NHS (non-clinical role). I'm in a hospital every day of my working week and I don't recall seeing 'dirty looking staff'. Lots of tired, slightly rumpled staff perhaps, but that is due to the pressure the Trusts put on them. They are told that they must see twice the patients in half the time with a fraction of the resources. Trusts all over the country are suffering from recruitment freezes and lack of funding for more doctors and nurses. Stress levels rocket and people are trying to do the best job possible with the resources available to them.

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:00

i dont know what you mean ndp

sorry, am tired. been awake since 6am yesterdy morning and cant go to bed as man coming shortly to fix my boiler

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 10:03

I think yours was a brilliant post !

Sorry you feel so ropey though. Hope man gets a wriggle on and sorts your boiler in double quick time so you canget some shut eye before the school/nursery run.

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:05

oh he will do

with me breathing donw his neck

AnneMayesR · 30/01/2008 10:07

Millie in ITU they only have one patient at a time. Maybe to. Tell your SIl to come out onto a 40 bed general medical ward with 10 high dependency beds and 2 nurses.

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 10:07

get the whip out and beat him if he slows down.

AnneMayesR · 30/01/2008 10:07

Oh dear that should have said maybe 2 patients at a time.

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:09

my unkempt appearance will probably be enough to put the fear into him ndp

tiredemma · 30/01/2008 10:09

Nervousal. Get real will you.

AnneMayesR · 30/01/2008 10:10

The problem on the general wards is taht nurses have too many patients and many of them can nearly be a sick as what they have in ITU. Our ITU nurses tell us that their job is a cake walk compared to working out on the wards.

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 10:10

ICU is a different kettle of fish entirely. Every nurse I have spoken to has said that ICU is a bit of a cushy number as the staff to pt ratio is much higher so there is someone to cover your meal breaks etc. As Anne says, if you are 1 of 2 nurses on a large complex ward then you can't nip off for a sandwich etc as it is a clinical risk (as if a nurse to pt ratio of 1:20 isn't enough of one !)

Ripeberry · 30/01/2008 10:11

Why has this thread turned into a nurse bashing thread?
Nurses are dedicated people who care about people's wellbeing, sometimes if not all the time before their own.
That is what attracted them to the job in the first place, certainlty not the pay or conditions.
Leave our nurses alone, they are doing a great job as it is, in very bad conditions.
AB

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:11

well they are talking shite anne
i work in itu on occasion and its no walk in the park or cake walk or whatever you said

stop making this into a competition "who is the hardest worker" or whatever. oh boohoo its me etc

expatinscotland · 30/01/2008 10:12

What is this, Slag Off Nurses Day, nervousal?

I hope that comment was made as a joke, but somehow I don't think it was.

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 10:13

Nurses are superb. The Trusts are fucking them over.

Bash the Trust bigwigs and the farking government for making promises they can't keep.

NomDePlume · 30/01/2008 10:14

sorry for language so early in AM

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:15

dont apologise ndp

WHERE IS MY FUCKING BOILER MAN

nervousal · 30/01/2008 10:16

no it was made in all seriousness - but certainly wasn't intended to slag of nurses. I work in NHS so am definitely on the side of nurses. However - at beginning of thread folk were agruing that the reason nurses looked unkempt is that they don't get paid enough. My point is that as they do not have to buy their own uniforms, their pay level has nothing to do with how they look.

nailpolish · 30/01/2008 10:17

we have to buy own shoes and cardigan nervousal

but we get a tights/sock allowance