Help with NHS and hiw to be moved wards

[Tiredohsotiredandabitmoretired]

Posting here for traffic.

Can anybody advise re the above? Partner was admitted on Thursday due to low oxygen. They've stuck him on a ward which is supposedly a surgical trauma unit. (Why not respiratory? ) the other patients all have dementia or other cognitive difficulties. One patient sleeps all day then shouts/screams all night so he hasn't slept. There's a chap who keeps getting up and getting in bed with other patients. One chap urinated at the end of my partners bed and another chap just decided to defecate on the floor. Can anyone help he's never going to get better on this ward. Is this just how it is now in hospital? What can I do to help him

Unfortunately this is how it is due to lack of beds. Patients like your dh 'boarded' wards not for what he's in for due to not being able to discharge other patients. It's chaos.

Respiratory is probably full of other patients with exactly the same difficulties.

Sorry he's going through this. No idea if/what can be done but hoping he's on the mend and home soon

Respiratory is likely to have a similar profile of patients.

Hopefully it's short term and he can get home soon to recover.

Have you spoken to the ward to ask why he's not been moved? I suspect it's probably a lack of beds on the relevant ward (this used to happen to DD once she reached adulthood, she's a chronic asthmatic and used to end up on some weird wards when admitted as an emergency) you can always speak to PALS.

Welcome to hospitals . You would be lucky to find any ward that doesn’t have elderly patients with dementia . Best idea is ear plugs and pull the curtains round the bed .

What you can do.

Get him ear plugs, snacks, headphones, a tablet with a charger.

Visit him and sit and guard the bed whilst he naps so he can get some rest.

Advocate to get him home as soon as possible.

The majority of patients will be elderly. He will be on that ward because that is where there is space. My DH recently spent 3 days in the discharge lounge because that was the only space they had.

My DM spent several days on a respiratory ward recently and it was exactly the same. Poor lady in her ward was so distressed she cried and screamed all night. It's not conducive to recovery but unfortunately there's not really an alternative. Ear plugs and home asap is the only real plan. Still, the ward was an improvement over the 36 hrs in a chair followed by the same again on a bed in a corridor! Hope your DH has a speedy recovery.

PALS may help. However if there are no beds available on a respiratory ward then he may have to wait. Is his care being reviewed by the respiratory team? Agree behaviours may be no different there, age related and mh issues can be present in any ward.

Realistically it'll be because there isn't a more appropriate bed available on the respiratory ward or a medical ward.

There may well be not much that can be done regarding that - providing that the ward has the appropriate equipment to care for a patient and that the relevant parent team are reviewing them etc. But by all means highlight it to the shift-cordinator or ward manager, in my hospital for example they may be to do some swapping where your partner can swap with a patient on a medical ward. Although belive me - there may well be elderly confused patients or people with dementia on any ward!

Equally (depending on the size of the ward itself) they may be able to swap him to a different bay that has less confused patients. We often try to cohort confused or wandersome patients into one bay and then have more staff in that bay.

So sorry your partner is having to suffer this. I ended up on a surgical reception ward last year. In the middle of the night I thought I had been put in a geriatric ward, chaos from two other patients and a constant stream of trollies in-and out. They were carrying out (emergency) operations through the night. Was relieved to see a younger woman admitted the next morning.
I think these days that a paediatric ward is the only place where there are not patients with dementia. And what about the effect on patients with dementia? it must add to their confusion.

It’ll be because of lack of beds on the respiratory wards.

It's having a significant impact on his MH I really feel for the others on the ward too. I'm not heartless at all but they are completely oblivious to it all DH unfortunately is not. He was supposed to swap beds with someone yesterday but apparently that is not happening now. I've always sang the praises of the NHS and I think all the docs and nurses are wonderful but this is horrific x

Eye mask as well as ear plugs to maximise his chances of napping during odd quiet moments during the day.

I fear this is the reality of hospitals these days.

Does he really need to be an inpatient? Could you bring him home with extra support/facilities? It might be worth exploring this with the discharge coordinator as they will be as keen as you are to get their inpatient numbers down. There may be support available that you just don't know about.

That is shocking. Of course he shouldn't be exposed to this. Ask to be sent home.and give the reason. Nobody should tolerate this.

What's his plan ? When do they think he will be fit for discharge ?
I would try and focus on anything that could be done at home.
It is most likely a bed issue.
Our respiratory wards 'pull' their patients so the sickest and most acute are in the beds first.

This happened to my mum. She was admitted with respiratory problems but was put on a general ward. Horrific experience right up to her death. No faith in hospitals now.

The respiratory wards, if there is one, he may end up on a medical ward, is likely to be full.
I deal a bit with bed movement and if we're full there's not much we can do I'm afraid

Agree with others- not everyone who needs a specialist bed can have one because there aren't enough; patients get triaged and the less complicated ones then "outlie" on other wards. It's not ideal.

I would also say that almost any adult ward will match your current experience. Does he have a long term condition or is this an acute illness?

And likelihood of moving over a weekend is small. It will rely on someone being discharged which, particularly if they need further care arranged, probably won't happen until Monday.

My Dad went through this. He had mental health patients needing care on his specialist health issue ward. He was seriously ill. He nearly died before arriving on that ward. He had faeces thrown at him. And a patient attempted suicide every night for 10 days. As a result he is now a total hospital refuser despite having complex needs.

I don't know what the answer is, but it isn't this!

Most wards are full of these patients, essentially ever increasing elderly population with higher levels of dementia and diminishing social care to support them in community - so they end up living out their days in hospital as there's no where else to put them.

You could enquire about a virtual ward/whether this is a possibility, many hospitals now run these - essentially to make up for the lack of beds in hospital people who should be in hospital but have a home with someone who could provide nursing care during the day can return home 'early' - the virtual ward team schedule a daily visit from to check obs/give medications etc - means you can recuperate at home and continue IV antibiotics/pain relief etc without the awfulness of the ward environment.

Everyone's right, it is awful. But this is not a hospital made problem - the hospitals simply can't discharge those patients even when they're no longer requiring hospital level care until there's a bed for them somewhere else - the majority of homes are privately run - these people are really complex to look after (i.e. expensive/time consuming/high ratio staff) so they are reluctant to take them (in a similar way to most families would be reluctant to take a parent in that state of mind into their own home). So they remain in hospital. Hospitals will be overcrowed until social care is 'fixed'.