To think all NICU nurses should wear body cams to keep babies safe?

[ElsaGreen]

After the awful tragedy of the Lucy Letby case, we need to do more to protect the most vulnerable children, children who cannot even speak for themselves.

Letby is not the first nurse to murder patients, there was also the case of Beverly Allitt. The doctor Harold Shipman also murdered patients... I know these healthcare professionals are in the minority...but how can vulnerable patients be kept safe without additional monitoring?

If we made all healthcare professionals wear body cameras would this help to prevent future murders?

It isn’t very well thought out, but I can perhaps see where OP is coming from. My DD was in NICU while the Letby trial was going on and it was a terrifying time.

I don’t think body cams are the way to go. My daughter has been in hospital a lot this year and a lot of mistakes have been made and poor care given by HCPs (not all of it bad but when you have been in that much you really start to see the cracks) and when complaining it is your word against there’s. I have always thought that if there was a camera in each bed bay it would be vital in these situations. The footage could be kept for a month and then burned unless it was needed in an investigation and the patient or their family would have to consent to this. I understand it’s not that straightforward but when you have seen some of the stuff I have I really think the minority of HCPs are who aren’t doing the best by their patients need to be held accountable.

You’re making no sense. You want vulnerable children to have the ‘protection’ of being filmed while they are in hospital but if their parents decide to home educate and hide them from the system they don’t deserve any protection?

You can’t see any difference at all between those 2 things?

Some perspective for you, you’ve named 3 examples in healthcare, obviously even 1 is too many but there’s 3 examples over a number of years. For context, in 22-23 children’s services received 640,430 referrals, quite a big difference in those numbers wouldn’t you agree?

I'm going to go against the grain.

I'm a paramedic and we have long had safety/surveillance camera inside the back of the ambulance (our clinical area). We also work closely with the police who have worn body cams for many years. So it is all perfectly normal to me.

Access to footage is extremely tightly regulated and no manager would have the time to be trawling through 24/7 shift cover across multiple resources anyway.

I think in the case of NICU nurses as with any HCP who frequently works in isolation with patients, cameras would provide THEM with protection as much as the patient.

I've attached a copy of an NHS ambulance trusts (not mine) guidance on the camera use. I wouldn't be worried about a coil fitting or breast examine in this context personally.

An excellent idea, body cams for all schoolchildren...that would stop bullying wouldn't it?

The footage could also be used by Ofsted to assess teaching.

Can you link to where it's been suggested that home educating parents wear body cams as I think I've missed that.

But then parents would not be able to accept that their little darlings might not be such angels?! wont go down well.

And as a home educator would you like your children wearing cameras at home? Having officials monitoring how well you are educating them?

What on earth have body cams got to do with occasional checks on home schooling parents?

Seriously, your posts are giving home educators a bad name.

Your complete lack of logic doesn't bode well for the kind education that your children are getting.

It wouldn’t have been effective in this case anyway, because it was only months and years after the deaths of many of the babies that their deaths began to be seen as suspicious - most were ruled due to natural causes at the time. On the basis that endless footage isn’t going to be kept for months of years of healthcare encounters where there’s no suspicion of anything, it would be a pointless endeavour.

I'm a community nurse and would embrace a surveillance camera, as it would be an elememnt of security for the incidents where either I'm vulnerable, my patient is vulnerable and would hopefully discourage threatening behaviour. At present we have security services for abusive patients but they wait outside which defeats the object really.

As long as my patients dignity was protected. I wouldn't mind, I have nothing to hide.

Monitoring home educated children has only come about because of the recent abuse and child murder cases. There are evil people everywhere and you cannot monitor everyone. Suggesting nicu nurses should wear bodycams, what about all the other staff, visitors and parents.

Yep can you imagine all those children and images out there. Never mind what any would not disclose under a video - child abuser or whatever.

Good point.

OP, you are seriously undermining the case for anybody to be allowed to Home School.

Given that LL probably didn’t do anything wrong, nurses should wear body cameras for their own protection 💁🏼‍♀️

As far as I can gather it has been suggested that children who have safeguarding issues that have been flagged up maybe shouldn't be home educated, or there should be some kind of record of kids who are home educated. That seems reasonable for all kinds of reasons. Not really too similar a thing to healthcare workers wearing body cams.... Nobody is suggesting putting cameras in the homes of kids who are home educated... So I don't get it....

Ive had 2 children who spent time in Nicu, 17 weeks in total.

I wouldn’t have wanted the nurses to have to wear anything to come in between them
cuddling and looking after my babies.

So why didn't you simply post about your concerns transparently in the first place?

Poor analogy to make your point OP. I fear this won’t raise the opinions of people who are suspicious of the efficacy home education with this one.

100% this, my youngest had a stint in NNU and the nurses there weren’t just a lifeline for my DD, they were for me as well as they cuddled her and loved her when I wasn’t able to.

We have a list of all the nurses working in an NCU and all the children in the hospital.

We do not even have a list of all the children who are homeschooled nor all the adults involved in the education of home educating children.

Certain home education communities have had their arse so far up there own arse they have lost the opportunity to work with local authorities to build sensible safeguards into potential legislation.

As it stands anything that is put in place is likely to be far more draconian. Education Otherwise and others have been so short sighted and scored a real own goal.

I say that as a parent who fully believes in the value of home schooling and that many many children thrive far more at home than they do at school

Too true..plus the Lucy Letby situation is incredibly incredibly rare. It's a once or twice in a lifetime scenario (thank goodness) unfortunately, shitty parents aren't quite as rare

We had a spate of batshit posts over vat on private schools. Is it now the turn of HE to post these threads?

OP having some proper checks as to whether you are HE your children is not like wearing bodycams. You would be asked for evidence you are HE, that is all.

Piss off to a conspiracy thread with that crap. There are several going at the moment. She’s not getting released despite the latest underhanded defence tactics.

Makes absolutely no sense OP. You are comparing HCP's who are qualified, trained and experienced in what they do, who are subject to regular skill checks and police checks (of course there are a few bad apples) vs parents with in most cases bo teaching training, no oversight, no monitoring and no police checks. If children in a classroom had an unqualified teacher who wasn't background checked there would be uproar. But children can be taught at home with no oversight.

I am not saying there should be no home schooling, for a small number of children with specific needs it is absolutely the best option for them. But the needs should be assessed and agreed that best met at home, and there should be regular visits, monitoring of learning and professional support for parents home educating. All children have a right to a broad and balanced education and the government has a responsibility to ensure this happens. I'm sure there will be examples of poor school education given as a counter arguement in a typical MN race to the bottom approach!