Thread for NHS staff

[LucheroTena]

How prepared do you think your place of work is? I work clinically in large teaching hospital and not at all confident we’re ready. Outside of wards there is very little planning and yet we have massive outpatient services. Elective stuff is being limited now but nowhere near enough capacity will be created. Millions in deficit so we’re operating on skeleton workforce and even when we can recruit no one wants to work here. Dozens of calls to our small team each day from worried patients, it’s taking up so much time to answer them all on top of already manic workload. Loads of staff with symptoms that are concerning but we’re not swabbing them and 111 uninterested unless they’ve travelled. Admin staff gleeful that they might soon be ‘working’ from home when truth is it’s difficult to get them to do much work on site let alone unsupervised. It doesn’t feel as though there is much consideration for clinical staff and now we’ll no doubt also be burdened with doing the jobs of admin. Never been as close to saying stuff it and quitting.

Friend in pharmacy (Boots) Wales has been told she is not a key worker so no kiddie cover. She will have to stay home until they have a change of heart

Help for N Wales NHS staff re testing.

north.wales/news/drive-through-unit-established-at-wrexham-maelor-to-test-for-coronavirus-in-nhs-staff-12658.html?fbclid=IwAR0po4Cg0y02PxeiqGibtD37LByZaPBEno3uY4tlO-R0LXC2jaGP81Nwmro

@FormerlyFrikadela01

www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/publication/next-steps-on-nhs-response-to-covid-19-letter-from-simon-stevens-and-amanda-pritchard/

Re: hotels, the official NHS England position is:

For those staff affected by PHE’s 14 day household isolation policy,
staff should - on an entirely voluntary basis - be offered the alternative option
of staying in NHS-reimbursed hotel accommodation while they continue to
work.

_
OP I take your comment about the usual sicknotes taking this opportunity to "self isolate" for 14 days. Sad thing is, without antibody testing you know they will take another 14 days after they are back for a bit, and then another and another.

OP I take your comment about the usual sicknotes taking this opportunity to "self isolate" for 14 days. Sad thing is, without antibody testing you know they will take another 14 days after they are back for a bit, and then another and another.

I said this yesterday. Thankfully we've only 2 I suspect will take the piss and low and behold the first rang yesterday becasue her dd had a temperature. We just have to hope its genuine and not a piss take.

For the sake of the dd, I'd rather it was a piss-take.

Our trust has just bought a machine that gets swab results back in 48hours so that isolating staff can be tested and return to work if negative.

I’m sure if your not someone who is regularly off sick then your colleagues wont think any less of you for following the government advice, but we all know people like the OP ment, off sick constantly at the drop of a hat but still posting on SM etc

I'm a senior manager in NHS IT and there is a lot of panic and finger pointing at the moment.

No real senior leadership and support for staff, just a daily email update- I'm IT but still expected to come in to the office , even though I could be putting my colleagues or family at risk by cross exposure unnecessarily

I'm worried- I've seen a lot of crisis in the NHS and we managed - this is different- it's every man for themselves.

Our infection control lead is useless- I'm
worried for my wonderful colleagues in the front line.

Medical and nursing staff are being bombarded by emails and updates but have no time nor equipment to actually read them!!
I sincerely hope these are being filtered and disseminated by ward managers and senior medical/surgical staff.

I only work in the community, pharmacist, how is it in the hospitals?

@Jade1976 I'm a hospital ICU pharmacist and it hasn't hit our ICU yet (Scotland) but we're expecting it next week or the following week. We're moving wards to allow surge ICU beds at present and making lots of final plans. It's going to be awful.

Question-I have a few days annual leave planned next week and the following week but I'd like to cancel this and work instead. In our trust we can't carry annual leave over to the following year but I wondered if this would be waived in the current circumstances. Anyone know?

Our trust are allowing AL to be carried over this year so it's worth asking.

@FormerlyFrikadela01 Snap! I had a colleague who hasn't worked a full six months in the many years she's been in our trust. Guess who was the first one off sick on Monday?! She's an absolute piss taker with no shame

@trumpisaflump we are giving the elderly, less mobile 2x meds. Salbutamol is a bit low. to you for cancelling leave. I would definately ask RE carrying over AL.

I am SE.

ask re carrying over AL. But I’d take next weeks if it hasn’t hit you yet. A couple of days holiday and coming back rested now might not be the worst idea,

I am feeling so deflated tonight. I feel we are being asked to go above and beyond and although the public are saying thank goodness for our nhs (which is lovely) it doesn't help when I have over £300 extra to pay in childcare fees each month with no increase to my wage. My child didn't qualify for a place in the school care as her dad isn't a keyworker. It's absolute chaos. Of course its nobody's fault and I dont blame anyone for it but do I feel appreciated? Absolutely not.

Also my partner is expected to be in work, and won't be paid if he isn't. I cannot believe we are in this position to be honest. Although I am low paid I do provide close contact & personal care for seriously ill and vulnerable patients.

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay good point. I've asked and we can't carry A/L over. Don't think they want any extra A/L requirements when it hits us which is fair enough.

What are everyone‘s Trusts doing about staff in the vulnerable health section? Ours has split the govt list into two groups and you only get to work from home or avoid patient contact if you’re in one of them, the rest of us have to carry on...I feel like I am being forced into being in a hospital when the Govt has said I am ‚strongly advised‘ to WAH. We are also awaiting redeployment and concerned what that could mean.

It’s an absolute clusterfuck Galloping. Suspect they got caught on the hop by the lists the other night.

And to top it all off the 14 day household isolation doesn’t apply so I’m going to end up working with people I know have a child/partner at home and are still well within the incubation period.

I feel really deflated too. I don’t think We’re really appreciated, on other threads there are lots of ‘at least you have a job’ comments.
I don’t think many people realise the stress we are/about to experience.
My cost of getting to work will also increase, my DH will be doing the childcare while working from home. I don’t think w wet w getting any support really. Just an expectation we will step up and not ask for anything in return.

I hope you get through all this I really do!

@Thatsabitwierd is your child's school asking for both parents to be keyworkers? My sons nursery are taking children in with only one key worker, I thought that was the governments decision?

It looks like my partners not working for the foreseeable but it's good to know if he did manage to find a job or do his job in this climate we would have childcare. We've just tried to claim some benefits and given up as it's so confusing, we need another £400 to pay bills next month and I'm not sure how we're going to do it. Hoping work will give me lots of extra shifts when I go in tomorrow.

@PonderLand yes both parents need to be keyworkers as they have limited space due to demand. Which is fair enough of course vulnerable & underprivileged children should be given priority but if they had been clearer about this before 3pm on Friday then it wouldn't have come as such a shock. All we have heard is "schools will stay open to allow key workers to work" so to be honest I thought it was exactly what it said on the tin. But no, I found out at the very last minute that wasn't the case. I'm over it now, I have got some childcare in place and will do my best. That's all any of us can do!