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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

smelly old ladies in hospital......

91 replies

psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 12:19

why can;t the nurses make them smell better??

is that not part of their job??

they help do bed baths on those stuck to bed, and change dressings, catheters, tubes going into/out of body parts, so why why why can they not help the little old lady opposite me who smells really bad.

she is mobile, but confused, and it isn;t fair, on her or anyone on the ward. it is such a shame.

I am sure if she had her younger self here, she would be horrified at the treatment.

I hope like hell that this never happens to me....it is hard enough losing dignity right now being stuck in here and having to go on commodes etc, without looking to the furture.

for her.

OP posts:
Original poster
psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 13:45

it really is sad the way the disease treats them.

we not allowed flowers on the ward.....assume it is infection risk. not a lover of lavender smell, but I do like other smells.....maybe I should get DH to bring in my perfume.

febreeze would work tho.....altho not as a perfume.....

as for me, yup to book and music, I have my ipod. got TV here too, altho tis not got sky, or living (my two fave channels).....or sci fi either. I could do with some buffy, or even my harry potter DVDs. problem is, for some weirdy reason, my DVD player on the laptop is gone psycho with the sound. I have the background noises, but not the main speaking. very hard to watch films when it is like that. It could do with someone looking at it, but I am not giving up my MN while it goes to fixer-upper-soundy-people.

OP posts:
Pollyanna · 03/02/2010 13:46

I was in hospital earlier this week with an old lady in the bed next to me.

She was also confused, kept pooing and weeing herself. But it was so hard on the nurses, and the rest of us - they spent so much time cleaning her, changing her bed, washing her false teeth, brushing her hair. She was shouting for the nurses all night for different things (I did feel like strangling her in the end actually).

The nurses were fantastic, but she was so demanding. she got so much of their attention, but she was still asking for more, saying that she was neglected. They couldn't do enough for her, and there was a whole ward full of other people needing help.

It is difficult, because I felt so sorry for her, but a mixed (old/young) ward really wasn't the place for her.

sallyjaygorce · 03/02/2010 13:49

Martin Amis would love this thread. Lots of candidates for his corner booths.

Psycho - how about a bit of Vicks under your nose - like Clarice Starling?

Original poster
psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 13:57

bicnod, thankyou for the good wishes. I am in heaven compared to you then really....and for not having to poo for my nurses.

littlereddragon.....she seems to understand what they say (well, she respeonds and has good vocab) just is confused about where she is. says she is fine, and altho she doesn;t know where she is, she seems to know she is not at home as she is telling the lady in the next bed she is going home today. but the lady in the next bed looks like she is ognoring her, (the next-bed-lady is deaf), which then makes her shout louder that she is going home. tis so sad

OP posts:
Original poster
psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 14:02

sally, vicks would work, I could pretend I am about to start work as a CSI

pollyanna.....last week I was on a mixed sex ward, and the old guy next to me was 93, had alziemers (sp?), and was incontinent but had a catheter as was bleeding in his bladder and they needed to measure in/out fluids etc.and kept stripping of naked to try and rip the catheter out. was utterly horrific, but the nurses for him were amazing, and he was a happy alziemers (if you can call it that) and was letting them do what ever they wanted to him, agreeing to it all. until they walked away, then off he would strip again.

he never slept either.....they had him out by the nurses station all night to try and help us sleep.

OP posts:
Pollyanna · 03/02/2010 14:04

I wish they had taken our old lady out - we got no sleep. She should have gone in one of the few single rooms on the ward - better for her dignity and us too really. But what she really needed was one on one care, and there was no way that was available.

She had no visitors either - very sad.

Original poster
psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 14:14

apparently there is actually a geriatric ward in this hospital, but it is full pretty much all the time, so beds are at a premium, sadly.

OP posts:
donkeyderby · 03/02/2010 16:21

If she's wearing pads, she's going to have to have a wash or the nurses wouldn't be doing their duty - her skin is likely to break down if she is incontinent and unwashed. I nursed for 10 years and don't remember anyone refusing a bath...not sure why really, though maybe it was presented as a 'no choice' option.

This 'choice' business, so loved by social services staff, is usually a euphemism for 'I can't be bothered to find a way to persuade this person so I'll leave them lying in their own shit'. It gets my goat. However, when I was a student nurse, I did once witness a district nurse giving a bed bath to a terminally ill patient when his relatives had expressly said they did not want him disturbed from his sleep. I feel ashamed now that I did not argue with her on this poor man's behalf. He died the next day.

It's nice that you are bothered about this lady. Good luck with your tests.

coldtits · 03/02/2010 16:22

Presenting personal care as a no choice option is institutional abuse.

coldtits · 03/02/2010 16:24

And it is NOT an excuse to be lazy. Lazy is when you don't offer. Believe me, it's easier and more pleasant to shower everyone when you think they need it rather than put up with the stink of someone who will not be washed.

morningpaper · 03/02/2010 16:24

so sad isn't it?

ToccataAndFudge · 03/02/2010 16:31

agree with coldtits all the way through this thread.

mummygirl · 03/02/2010 16:44

my experience with english hospitals unfortunately is that if you don't have your relies there looking after you you're on your own :-(

Poor old lady though...

coldtits · 03/02/2010 16:48

You can't just wade in and forcibly wash someone! how would you like to have that done to you? !!!

ampere · 03/02/2010 16:59

And, mummygirl, for fear of shoving a stick in a hornet's nest, I have witnessed irate middle aged, well dressed, articulate woman march to the deserted nurses station as they're all out tending patients , demanding to know why no one is spoon feeding elderly mum right now. WTF don't YOU??

I get this in my health care job (not nursing: I am not saint-like enough!): Elderly out- patients who need help to change into a gown, then dress again after their procedure: fair enough, but when you ask if the hospital car service is coming to get them, they reply 'Oh no, my daughter's in the waiting room..', And sure enough, there she'll be, thumbing through her Vogue whilst we've made everyone else's appointments run late cos that lazy cow couldn't be bothered to assist her own mum! Yes, I know there are some 'circumstances' but really, if we DID have a culture where a relative was expected to help out with an in-patient who needed it, nurses would be able to nurse more!

And yes, our Rights Culture has created the situation where smelly elderly people cannot be cleaned against their wishes.

One more interesting extension: We are looking at 'informed consent' far more these days. I suspect an awful lot of people who really NEED diagnostic tests or interventions won't get them because they are too confused or ill to indicate 'informed consent'.

It is a worry!

Original poster
psychomum5 · 03/02/2010 17:04

I was moved away from her.

went for a scan on my liver....(no results on that yet, they need to compare stuff)

came back

she next to me, not just opposite.

I feel bad for her

but right now

worse for myself

and bad for feeling bad IYGWIM.

this system sucks. I agree that it is not fair to force her, but really, there should be some ways around it.....if only for her own comfort, especially if she IS at risk of sores or whatever with the pads.

OP posts:
ToccataAndFudge · 03/02/2010 17:04

you know some perfectly "sane" elderly people refuse to be washed as well.

Automatically I guess you're all thinking "oh they're all old and confused/have dementia" - actually some of them have issues of embarrassment, fear, pride, all sort of emotions

(imagine how you would feel if tomorrow morning you woke up to find you were unable to wash yourself - and had to have a stranger wash you - yes some of you would be ok with it - others not so - for understandable reasons)

That is another reason why relatives are often left to do it - because it's one less "barrier" to cross for that old (or not so old) person.

Northernlurker · 03/02/2010 17:06

ampere I totally disagree with you. We cannot (I'm an NHS manager) impose an interevention on a patient because we think it's the right thing to do and they are too mad to say otherwise! Likewise how exactly do you clean a smelly elderly (and therefore) fragile person against their wishes without it being an assault?

Northernlurker · 03/02/2010 17:08

pyscho - have you spoken to the nurses about this?

mummygirl · 03/02/2010 17:08

ampere, my anger is gone because all this happened to me years ago and I don't live in the country anymore so it's not a worry for the future.

But I DID NOT have anyone there to clean me and change me and sometimes I'd have to wait in a wet or even soiled nappy until the morning shift . Not to mention that DH got kicked out in the rudest way half way through spoonfeeding me my dinner because visiting hours time was over. Fair enough. But I did stay hungry as noone came to feed me after he was gone

ampere · 03/02/2010 17:18

Um -Northernlurker- surely you agree with me?

Yes of course we can't 'impose' an intervention on a patient! Which is why we are looking so carefully at the issue of Informed Consent! I so urge you to go down to your CT department tomorrow and see whether you think all the elderly, semi-conscious, totally confused, immobile folks being wheeled in for their head scans have really given their informed consent. Really, please do it. You will be shocked. The problem, which I shouldn't need to spell out to you is that someone has ascertained that we need to know whether a patient has had a stroke, or maybe has a brain tumour, or is simply in extreme old age. It would be negligent (in the legal sense) for us not to perform these tests and would be seens a s a total cop out if we refused to scan every patient who didn't say or indicate in any way 'Yes, I understand what this test is for, what its benefits are and and risks inherent with undergoing this test'. It would be lovely if we could sit with them and attempt to ascertain this but we get 10 minutes per scan. Do the maths.

And I also said "And yes, our Rights Culture has created the situation where smelly elderly people cannot be cleaned against their wishes" to agree with earlier posters who have stated why there are perhaps more smelly patients on wards today than there were when Matron was in charge 30 years ago!!

Actually, as an NHS manager, you are the right person to address this remark to:

We need FAR more geriatric beds. End of. Geriatric nursing is a speciality and generally involves a much lower patient to staff ratio than you will find in just about any other general ward. Whilst it would be lovely if every nurse can give the care and time to an elderly, confused person to win their trust and persuade them to be washed, welcome to the real world.

My experience tells me that a good 75% of patients in our general medical and orthopaedic wards are 'geriatric' but the funding and staffing aren't.

ampere · 03/02/2010 17:22

mummygirl- what I meant was that if relatives were a) there, and b) able, of course they should be encouraged to help! That would be an ideal situation and would free up staff to assist those who didn't have any rellies to hand.

I would expect anyone to necessarily bedbath or worse a relative in hospital but I have seen what I detailed before, re the middle aged, 'entitled' woman demanding someone else help her own mum to feed while she sits by.

mumonthenet · 03/02/2010 17:33

psycho,

re your dvd player sound...only getting background noise - can you have a fiddle with the sound settings. Just wondering if it's something simple you could resolve.

This happens at home with my dvd player...if I forget to turn on the extra external speakers then I only get background noises of the soundtrack on the tv. Really weird.

Do not ask why we have extra speakers..just think men, gadgets, añd bloody wires everywhere.

Northernlurker · 03/02/2010 17:33

ampere you said 'I suspect an awful lot of people who really NEED diagnostic tests or interventions won't get them because they are too confused or ill to indicate 'informed consent'.' - I read that as meaning you thought that was a bad thing and that bugger consent we should just press on.

Likewise 'And yes, our Rights Culture has created the situation where smelly elderly people cannot be cleaned against their wishes' read to me as if you though that was a bad thing too.

Am hugely relieved that was not your implication!

Thanks for the suggestion but I don't need to pop over to CT - my area of work has quite enough confused and unwell people in it to be going on with. Efforts should always be made to ensure that a patient understands as far as able what is going to happen to them. Unfortunately life often outlasts memory. I am aware that more carers are needed on the wards. In my hospital they are putting more HCAs on to the medical wards for exactly this reason.

shandyleer · 03/02/2010 17:36

Hello psycho, hope you start to feel better soon, and I sympathise re the smell situation. Poor old lady though - perhaps if she has only been in hospital for a short time, it may take her a while to settle down and realise (if she is able to appreciate anything about her own situation) that she is in a safe environment. She may then become less jittery and agree to be washed. Or just as likely she may not, but like others have said, there's not a whole lot to be done about it, other than for the staff to keep offering (and for you to hold your sheets up to your nose as she passes perhaps)

When dm was in hospital a few years ago, she was distressed to hear staff tell an elderly lady in a nearby bed to soil herself as it would be less hassle for them to change the sheets than help her to the toilet .

And a couple of months ago, dh was in a bed opposite a terribly well spoken ex-colonel type. His relatives were also apparently well to do - and so well mannered that they affected not to notice that quite often he would make his way to the toilet, leaving a trail of little pebbles en route .....