To ask what NHS frontline staff think of Breathtaking?

[CloudyYellow]

I have watched all 3 episodes. I worked on the frontline during Covid. I found it very triggering and my fury is back.

Thanks for explained and for such a measured response. What you say makes sense and explains why hospitals didn't always appear overwhelmed.

Re the dancing, to a lot of people I imagine it seems like a lot of work to organise, gather a team of people, rehearse and film a dance for TikTok. Yes there are 'breaks' but not sure how this could be achieved during breaks unless the staff in question ALL went on a break at the same time. Unlikely on a good day - impossible I'd say at the height of a pandemic.

Is it just me whose not remembering these tik tok extravaganzas that required hours of planning, rehearsal & coordination plus professional filming?

the only ones I recall seeing were a few nurses jigging about for about a minute doing a usually well known party dance like the cha cha slide filmed on someone’s phone

What a ridiculous response. Just go away.

Took me FOUR goes to get a second vaccine. The roll out didnt go smoothly in all areas.

I couldn't watch, started as it just came on but had to switch over. While we shouldn't forget, I am also not ready to relive it.

@Jumpingthruhoops its not really clear why you are so focused on this one thing. People actually know now that the government were having cheese and wine parties while also instructing police to arrest people who broke bubble rules, so why are nurses who might have been together in the staff room on a break or before/after their shift and made a quick pick me up video so important to you? They were not dancing around peoples ventilators and were probably just trying to find some kind of mental relief or escapism from what was going on. The reason people gave free food was because they felt helpless and didn’t know how else to help or show support. They just wanted to show their support that’s all it was. I also explained that not all hospitals are A&E’s or ITU’s and a lot of staff were not deployed to wards for various reasons so there were a lot of NHS estate buildings very quiet. I know a lot of teleconsults were taking place so perhaps these nurses were calling patients all day on the phone and doing their paid work but also got breaks

I don’t I can watch it.
I worked on the Covid wards at the height of the epidemic. So many people died on my wards 😢
The heartbreak of finding people dead in side rooms alone was just horrific.
Even when families were allowed to come and sit with their dying relatives (PPE’d up) they refused as they were too scared to catch Covid 😞 so many of their relatives died alone.
ICU was horrific as well.
We closed Maternity down in our hospital and turned it into a Covid ward.
Of course the corridors were empty as no visitors were allowed.
i certainly didn’t do any Tik Tok dances and never once saw any of my colleagues do anything for social media!

NHS staff, among other key workers, were often working 15+ hours per day in roles they sometimes had very little experience of following redeployment.

Being allowed to go to the front of supermarket queues (at a time when many other people were furloughed and enjoying the warm weather) is wholly acceptable in my view given that key workers were working in challenging conditions at a stressful time.

What did you do in the pandemic?

No it didn’t. The central stock line was absolute chaos. We didn’t know if/when/how much would turn up! I once waited 10 hours by myself in an empty hall to get given 30 vials from the van driver! at one point we were given thousands of them at short notice and scrambled to get rid. The National booking service was so hard to use. The system pharmoutcomes constantly crashed and we had to use paper and then spent hours inputting them all manually late into the night. We didn’t have enough IT bandwidth to handle it sometimes. I could explain the chaos it was all night

Most of the hospitals were empty as they were turning patients away to ‘save the NHS’.
Consequently many died due to not receiving lifesaving treatment for their cancer etc.
If staff were so busy how did they have time to rehearse and film complicated tictok dance routines?

Too soon, too raw for me to contemplate watching.

it was fucking terrifying, we couldn’t access tests initially and I was sharing a house with an immunosuppressed transplant patient whilst working as a nurse through this.

Even this thread with @peakygold and @Jumpingthruhoops comments is too much for me.

I don't know iv I can watch it.
My partner is a nurse and was redeployed to a ward where basically people who weren't heading to ICU were sent to die. He moved out forb3 months to avoid bringing it home to us. We had to rent a shitty flat, the cheapest one we could afford ourselves. We used to go and stand and wave up to him at the window. He held the hands of so.msny dying people and not knowing what to say, recited poetry and told them how important they were and loved.
It changed him. He was offered a link to a mindfulness app for support.
I was seconded into a job for the govt., working 18 hrs days while my poor kids were neglected. They both were deeply affected. They still are

My dad died during a low-down.notnof could but none of us saw or spoke to him for his last 2 weeks. He died alone on a ward and we all live with the trauma of his end.

I hate the tories for how they were.
We all have contributed to the Inquiry in different capacities. It felt like I had to.

There are over 600,000 clinical staff in the NHS. How many did you see on TikTok?

Agree. Some people were working incredibly hard while not knowing what risks they might be facing. For other people this was a time of being paid to sit in the sunshine and join in Joe Wicks fitness broadcasts while complaining that NHS staff might get free food during their shifts or priority queuing (to get the petrol they needed to get to work).

I won’t be watching it, it isn’t something I want to revisit.

I've not watched it yet but I will. I think the public, as evidenced here, seem to think we all had it easy, were getting free food & doing nothing. I will never, ever forget having to hold iPads for elderly, dying patients and trying to get them through to their equally elderly and isolated family wives/husbands who were terrified. Or the times we ran out of body bags, so patients were having to be left, deceased, in their rooms with a sign on the door. I will never forget an elderly man's family congregated in the car park with signs to wish him a happy 90th birthday & knowing they would probably never see him again. Helping on unfamiliar wards & there being very little PPE, certainly not enough for everyone so having to risk covid (don't forget we were still unsure if it would kill us) or not being able to enter rooms for patients who needed us so realistically there was no choice. Going to a stroke ward and it being me (HCA) and one nurse for 22 covid patients. She wouldn't share her visor with me (understandably) and some patients still weren't washed by 2pm. Horrendous. It wasn't good enough & patients and staff were failed over and over. I never knew what I was going into, and to top it off, my own mum died suddenly right at the time of the Downing St parties. I couldn't see her for months before she died & I feel robbed of that time. I never once went to the front of a queue, took free food or gained from nhs status in any other way and even if people did, so what. It wasn't easy to stay home but I can assure you it was far easier than going into see 6/7/8 people dying every shift.

Do you think the frontline staff on here are lying?

Give me fucking strength!! 😡

I've watched it, looking back at the challenges it heart breaking it appears we haven't learned a single lesson, the whole PPE issue has never really been discussed/resolved. Why aren't they shouting from the roof tops how they will prevent it happening again.

They have never admitted that they had to make some very difficult decisions, which they knew would kill people. Thats the job of a government, but be honest about it, especially to HCPs who can clearly see what is happening.

To me even at the time locking down the schools was the worst decision. The shops, bars cinemas etc being closed was socially acceptable but schools being closed worried parents. If the kids were in school it's likely we could have had a softer lock down for longer and it might have scared some of the more vulnerable to 100% stay home.

The messaging at the time of everyone is vulnerable just didn't reflect reality, yes people were scared but they didn't tell those at risk who really need to shield. Then opening up and including the elderly in it sends shivers down my spine. We had my grandparents in lockdown from the February until they were fully vaccinated.

They didn't have the capacity to test before discharge to care homes, but they have never really admitted it. It's obvious they made the difficult decision to sacrifice those in care homes to free up beds for the expected patients who might have a chance of surviving.

We have a child whose education suffered over lockdown as our schools closed to everyone (number of HCPs kids made it impossible to open). Looking back I would risk anything to make sure he doesn't have to go through the catch up the kids have faced ever again. They had a full time table of online lessons so can only imagine the situation of kids whose schools did the minimum.

The fact we haven't learned from it is almost more painful than the unnecessary deaths. Now when we aren't facing the challenge is the time to have the discussions over how we respond to similar in the future I.e

*do we have a stock pile of the supplies we need?
*who do we sacrifice (ie elderly/vulnerable deaths vs kids education)?
*how do we develop and test the vaccine?
*do we allow challenge trials?
*should shielding of the vulnerable be a legal requirement and if they are found to have broken it do we prioritise their care?

The main areas of our hospital were a ghost town as the majority of patients were covid patients in wards and we were were following the one way system so people didn't congregate.

No one was allowed to have breaks together so we were separated. There was no none essential staff like admin who make up a big chunk of staff or medical staff doing routine appointments

I was laboratory testing based. We didn't have ppe ( we used fabric face masks for ages) as needed more for patient facing staff when there was any. We didn't have ability to social distance while working as had small space and all the staff were needed to carry out procedures. We all had covid several times.

I realise reading all these replies that we were so lucky as none of our colleagues died but sadly a young colleague did get long covid and was medically retired after a year.

I think its incredibly hard to even imagine what patient facing staff went through even though I was working in the same hospital. I'm glad they have made a docu drama about it to show everyone.

I was twice redeployed to ITU during covid. I won’t be watching. I’m sure I have ptsd. Even the trailer made me feel panicky.

A couple of colleagues who have seen it said it seemed quite true to life.

DH refused to accept people back without clear tests. The local authority and the home owners were not happy with him but the relatives were very grateful. I’m incredibly proud of him.

Definitely triggering, watching it has brought back the feelings of panic, fear and helplessness that I felt working as a front line nurse both on the wards and then in ICU. I think the experience has left a lot of front line workers at the time with deep set anxiety.

Ex NHS here but left before the pandemic

I’ve just watched the second episode of Breathtaking, if I ever saw Boris Johnson, Matt Hancock or any of the others tw*ts involved in decision making during the pandemic I’d probably get arrested 😡

I knew it was bad but to see it from the medical staff perspective is just so harrowing 😣

It's very accurate. I watched it but it was hard going, the triggers hit you in the most unexpected ways. It was terrible and it was terrifying. I had a letter in my desk for my family just in case. Imagine thinking you need that? It's like something out of a war zone. Which is what it was.

I went the front of some queues. I was working all week and wouldn't let my husband shop because we were admitting so many men compared to women. Four years on I would have thought people would have let that go but I guess not. So next pandemic you can come do my job and I'll stay at home and queue. But don't forget the letter for your kids in case you don't make it home.