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.

Frontline nhs here, all electives and outpatient appointments cancelled. We have been told to prepare to work outside of our roles with possible changes to shift times. Unprecedented and scary times ahead.

Admin here. Started work 5.30am today and finished half an hour ago. Anticipating much the same for the foreseeable.

I work in infection control in a hospital, we've tried for weeks to order PPE, swabs etc but cant get any from the NHS supply chain. We're struggling to be honest, lack of info for staff, cant have handgel for patients as its restricted etc. The staff work hard, the shit we get from the patients and visitors is unreal and we've not got the equipment to do our jobs properly.

Front line here. Getting lots of advice within own department and we feel prepared, though there is anxiety about the unexpected. Some other departments in the hospital are woefully unprepared, which is odd as we are all part of the same trust.

Re the student nurses qualifying early : I can see that numbers on the floor will be a good thing, however is seasoned staff are anxious and struggling to cope, how will we support new starters? Will be added stress for everyone and would hate for new nurses to leave based on this.

Planning for working lots over next few months, as long as I’m not sick. The NHS always steps up, and I am proud to be able to help however I can, whenever I can.

Doctor here. Not on the front line as in I don’t work in A/E or ICU. Hospital I work in is stepping up it’s game from next week. I’m a bit worried that the information coming from our Italian and Chinese colleagues is that the only thing that seems to help is social distancing but Boris seems to want to not do this.

I'm admin in a health centre supporting community staff so not really front line. Daily conference calls seem to be happening, posters up everywhere and a designated room in case someone comes in to the building thinking they have the virus.
But nervous about schools being closed as ds has autism and thrives on routine. Doubt I'll be able to work from home but as dh is currently off sick he will be there to look after ds, dd is almost 14 so pretty self sufficient.

I am worried about catching it or passing it on to dh as he is on immuno suppressants....... can't find any advice on how best to deal with this.

Inpatient mental health nurse here in a dementia service. Very little concrete information has been given to us. The information we've been given for managing a coronavirus case on the ward is completely unworkable (we're supposed to ask people to self-isolate in their bedrooms with a mask on, but there's been no consideration whatsoever to what to do with patients like ours that are severely cognitively impaired and won't be able to follow this advice). Presumably they would have to be moved to a different ward but not clear where this would be, or how we would manage in the interim. It's also been hinted at that we may be unable to leave the ward as they are ordering in extra food and linen for staff to prepare for such a scenario where we are quarantined to the ward, which is a nightmare for all us, especially people like me with children. All of our handgels have been stolen, and most of us haven't been fitted for our masks yet.

I work for the Ambulance Service front line, we have had lots of PPE delivered ( tons of it) and alot of training and regular updates being given about our own guidelines and protocols and regular updates from receiving hospitals.

We are very well prepared and lots of extra staff as well as myself are working overtime as well as regular shifts to meet the current demand, as most days especially at the moment it feels like the service is at breaking point.

Thank you so much for starting this thread, I was starting to feel so alone .
Primary care nurse here, I see all the minor illness that comes into our surgery so very much front line .
Minimal PPE given to us, gloves, plastic apron and bog standard surgical masks .
Only a few bottles of alcohol gel left in the surgery too .
To say I am concerned would be putting it mildly.

Another Thank You
I've had to use the NHS a lot this last 12 months and felt the pressure people are under.
And then Covid.
I had day surgery two weeks ago, you could feel the change in atmosphere.

Easy to say here but I sincerely wish you all the best of luck and the eternal hope that people make it easier on you.

Just marking to read and join in. I'm nhs and looking fwd to supporting on here

Really robust planning at my place but we are depending upon managers to properly cascade info. Some info is slow to get out because it keeps changing - ppe guidance changed last night and again this morning.

I really hope no one is donning yellow hazmat suits as that's never been the guidance and a complete waste of time and resources (plus hideous to work in) should be in white with ffp3 mask (in certain very specific circumstances).

Any staff feeling wobbly or like you're Hospital or ccg isn't acting should speak to their manager. I'm fairly confident it will be happening but relevant staff will be informed as we don't really have time to keep updating staff who aren't directly involved. We'd only be repeating the National stuff anyway.

I'm admin/reception in a GP surgery. The doctors are triaging all respiratory issues via telephone now. Huge signs saying not to come in. Other local practices are locking the doors but we are not quite there yet and hoping that the public will be helpful in keeping things going by listening to advice and staying away with symptoms.

The new advice to self isolate with a cold will hit our staffing levels badly. I'm not sure how we will manage if schools close.

Apologies if I’ve upset admin staff. I know there are plenty of hardworking and great administrators. In the past I’ve relied on them completely. Unfortunately where I work now we have an underperforming workforce on relatively high pay. It’s frustrating.

I'm not NHS but work in a nursing home.

We are woefully unprepared.

If one of us gets it, or a resident gets it, that could well be the end of home.

We had a gastro bug go like wildfire a couple of months ago. It put two of them in icu. It's heavy on dementia patients so while the staff are all hot on infection control the people living there are not.

We are rapidly running out of hand gel. We're working with half capacity bathrooms because we are running out of soap and paper towels.

Also rapidly running out of ppe. Had a night shift on Tuesday and we were down to our last two boxes of gloves and had no aprons left at all. Delivery wasn't due till today.

The bosses won't restrict visitors in any meaningful sense either. All they have done is stick up a few hand washing posters and forward some of the advice being given out by email to staff.

A few of us have worrying symptoms but like pp aren't being tested as not been to affected areas. We're already understaffed and can't afford anyone else off (regularly have 3-4 agency staff, any more would be really bad as they naturally don't know the residents, some of whom can be very aggressive, particularly with strangers).

It's very worrying.

Community nurse here, so glad to see I am not alone.

Planning has been happening for last couple of weeks , had and failed mask fit but no suggestion of hood as an alternative!

Team who were Mask safe have been swabbing in peoples homes last week, then drive through service this week. However now hugely short of both swabs and PPE, new guidance issued today masks don't need to be fitted and surgical masks will do...but we haven't got any of those either, and long sleeved gowns not needed aprons will do.

The sheer number of emails daily is impacting on workload, GP's locally have made the decision to only visit vulnerable patients ( most of my caseload)only in most dire situations, GP surgery also can't get hold of hand gel.

Driving into work this morning was delighted to hear news announcer say when hospitals are full people will have to be nursed in the Community, we had limited capacity in the first place! Most of my staff have school age children so will struggle when schools shut.

To top it all I have a very vulnerable dc chronic lung disease so don't know what to do for the best there.

I think the threat of schools closing is a much bigger fear for me for staffing than Covid-19 infection. Most of our nursing and medical workforce has school aged children.

I’m a GP, we had an emergency practice meeting today. All seems quite surreal and I’m very anxious about going in to work in the morning as God knows how it will go...surgery doors locked, no walk in surgery, no elderly care home visits. We have only two bottles of hand gel left. Our PPE consists of a crappy plastic apron and flimsy face mask. I wasn’t scared until this morning when it all dawned on me how life isn’t going to be the same for some time 😢

Thank you for all you do. I am not a health worker so apologies for reading your thread. I wanted to understand the pressures you are under and see if there is anything we can do to help?

What can the public do to support you - using the right service is one I guess, and following the guidance from PHE but is there anything else that we can practically do? I imagine so many people would want to support you all in whatever way we can, but a bit lost for ideas on what would be useful.

(And who is taking the hand sanitizer?)

Have any foundation doctors/ other junior drs heard anything of keeping us in our posts for longer as we're experienced already in them, rather than change over in April?

We've been told nothing by our trust but have obviously heard many a rumour on the grapevine so we're intrigued as to how other trusts are preparing!

The matron old me yesterday that the isolation wards were “carnage”. Not because the Covid patients were particularly sick but with all the confusion over PPE: changing advice, time to don it, the fact we were running low on a fair bit of it such as masks and visors.

Patients, visitors and staff have been stealing the bottles of hand sanitiser and wipes.

The extra money promised is almost useless really. We can’t find the equipment or staff even if we have the money to pay them. There needs to be a massive bonus for the affected NHS staff somewhere in all this. It’s pretty much danger money.

I agree a lot of the issue is lack of clear, consistent guidance. I know its evolving, but it's really worrying to not have access to the correct equipment and what to follow. I think that the supply chain for hand gel etc should have been prioritised for healthcare, although not sure logistically how that would have been implemented. Buying is extremely slow at the best of times for widely available items.

I work in mh part of a clinical team working with ex offenders living in a hostel

Tbh until yesterday all seemed a little too relaxed apart from the constant emails from our trust

I don’t think we are prepared at all, some residents due to their medication should they become ill will need their bloods monitored, others have underlying health issues. How it will be managed if one becomes ill

The residents are now becoming anxious, staff are anxious

I hope today we are given more clear guidance as at the moment it’s all a little vague

We've been told to cohort our respiratory patients. We're a paeds assessment unit so see ages 0-15. I feel this is a terrible idea because we could be putting potential covids in with yet to be diagnosed asthmatics and bronchiolitis.
We are only swabbing the kids that will be staying in and not the ones that are going home.
In theory GPs should not be sending suspected covids to us, they should go to the pod however I doubt this will happen as GPs already use us as a dumping ground.
We have 40 inpatient beds and one allocated cubicle for covid.
We also do all the testing for neonatal jaundice in our town so we see around 10 newborns every day. It's these babies that we are worried about, they are so vulnerable.
Badly organised as per usual for the NHS.

However now hugely short of both swabs and PPE, new guidance issued today masks don't need to be fitted and surgical masks will do...but we haven't got any of those either, and long sleeved gowns not needed aprons will do.

See this is what I mean by us all being cannon fodder. The guidance from the beginning was long sleeve gowns, ffp3 fave masks, gloves and eye protection. But as soon as it becomes clear that they cant provide that it's a case of fuck it, you'll just have to do with the crappy surgical masks and aprons. The advice is the US has changed too due to supply issues.

The limited morale our staff have at the moment is quickly evaporating as it becomes clear we're expecting to just turn uontonwork, maintain the service and fuck anything else.