The hospital I work in is so quiet

[QuietHospital]

London hospital.
Half empty. Some wards have less than a handful of patients, some wards are closed. Most staff have been moved to wards so are falling over selves. While their regular work goes undone.
A&E very quiet. I’ve sent patients there who are seen immediately. The heart attacks, strokes and appendicitis cases are presenting too late. People with covid are waiting too long to present. If you get breathless then for goodness sake come in. I’m so cross at the initial advice to stay home until struggling.
Had a look through covid ward lists and vast majority patients are aged over 70. Hardly any patients under 60, those who are have underlying health problems for the most part. Lots more men than women affected.
It’s just a snapshot but echoed by colleagues in other hospitals.
I think we can / should start to move back to normal life soon for the well young people among us. I fear for the short and longer term economic hit. It’s crazy to have all these young well people furloughed or made redundant.

I'm getting the same impression from friends who work in various healthcare settings.
Also there seems to be not a lot of if you have heart attack/ stroke symptom. Please ring 999. The non related Covid deaths is going to rocket because they are worried. Not just because of catching Covid but they don't want to be a burden.
I think all this extra bed space and nightingale hospitals were set up because of the usual 4 hour wait for an a+e bed & Covid the nhs wouldn't have coped. But because the usual 4hr wait has dropped significantly. There is more space. But at the detriment of those with normal ailments

To be honest if myself or a family memeber were struggling to breathe I’d bypass 111 and go to A&E myself and make a fuss if needed. Especially after what I have read on here and in the news.

I hate to think of all these people suffering at home, kids losing parents/grandparents as they didn’t get the right care. This should headline news and the government pulled up on itZ

@louise5754 Well I cant know 100% obviously but have been 'diagnosed' by 3drs, had basically every single symptom possible, work in healthcare so around a lot of people all day and never had an illness like it in my life and am still off sick and recovering 6 weeks later.

this is such a different story to the ones I'm hearing from close friends and family. Four in London hospitals, two in Herts, one a London GP, one in a slightly unusual location which I won't say because it's very identifying. They have been swamped and are exhausted and are really not pushing for lockdown to end or for things to change just yet in their trusts.

Three in rural Scotland very quiet, on the other hand, which seems more to be expected.

How odd. So very odd.

The death figures out today suggest there are indeed quite a lot more non covid deaths than usual.

Regarding cancer, GPs have remained accessible for all advice and 2 week urgent referrals have continued, 111 is available 24/7 too.

Maybe in your area. Not in ours.

perhaps the slogan was misguided, the focus is on protecting you.

No it's not. I'm protecting myself by staying home, no one else is protecting me.

I'm expected to protect the service that's there to protect me, but that won't even admit the ill unless they are at death's door.

And I will be expected to protect it after this is over, by a raise in taxes and NI and by being expected to put up with usual lack of appointments, because NHS.

We need a cross party approach to this, every single party uses the health service for their means and the public fetishises it and this is why we are here.

It makes sense there are geographical differences, hard to predict with a three week lag.

It would appear some trusts are in the midst of it. Overloading them even more wouldn’t be the right way to go.

Geographical differences wrt lockdown I’m not sure about.

@Missy and @Peapod thanks for the insight. My question was kind of rhetorical but I've appreciated reading your responses. It does sound like a really badly managed situation. Not allowing people to be deployed to where they are needed seems bonkers. As for lockdown coming too late, that too was my thinking. Did the UK miss the current peak? Plus, as many have said, it would seem other institutions are being thrown under the bus to save the NHS. I don't understand the delayed admission policy either for COVID patients or why other wards are not being turned over to COVID to alleviate pressure. I watched a fantastic interview with a doctor in Wales about 1 or 2 weeks ago. They seemed much closer to capacity then than a lot of people are suggesting on here now.

I'm not sure why anyone is surprised that certain parts of hospitals have no patients when that is the whole point of the current lock down, keep as many people as possible at home to not overwhelm the NHS as they knew that there would not be enough staff and equipment available to cope with covid on top of the usual patients. I certainly agree that the no admission unless you're blue needs to stop and they should look at restarting urgent treatment sooner rather than later but this has to be managed. The government can't do right for doing wrong at the moment. NHS staff are sat around twiddling their thumbs whilst people die at home, whilst other NHS staff are dying at work from lack of ppe.

I absolutely agree the NHS needs an overall. I think a bit of breathing space is needed for the frontline workers, we’ve faced something so unexpected and horrific. Appreciate this is not the case in every service.

I suspect this is very trust specific, when we gather our feedback, I think our patients will say they were able to access services appropriately.

Thank you to the people who are staying home to reduce the spread.
We are indebted to the workers who have lost their lives - not just nhs.

Not all of us are trivialising @Born. It is terrifying and tragic. And suggesting that there has been an overreaction to COVID in the UK is bonkers. 15,000+ deaths in a month. How could that be an overreaction? You can feel angry and frustrated at the system for failing non-COVID patients and still think the government lockdown etc is a good idea.

NHS admin & management were often shambolic in "normal" times. It's hardly surprising they can't cope with a pandemic.

The slogan is “Save Our NHS”.

No it isn't.

It's "Stay at home. Protect the NHS. Save lives."

@Wiaa but that is the government's fault. The fact that some are thumb twiddling whilst others are dying is entirely down to poor resource management. That's the government.

I agree nhs admin/management are often ineffective and they are a costly service.

Part of the problem is that the situation is so area specific and trust specific, but the government has no choice but to enforce nationwide rules (or people would just leave the lockdown areas). It is very concerning that people aren't presenting at hospital when they should be, and that the criteria for admission with COVID seems to be that you have to be pretty much at death's door.

havent read the whole thread but - staff are being moved around between hospitals. NHS 111 urgently needs new guidance to get more people in and over this quickly and we need more plasma trials on the seriously ill.

Once the government gets a serious number of tests going it will be possible to have Covid-19 free hospitals. Lets stress this - government failure to get enough tests is a major problem.

Some of the staff, if they are genuine, claiming to be twiddling their thumbs really need to be redeployed as I know others are getting worn out.

Once lockdown is relaxed cases will rise again, dramatically if the government permits large gatherings. Lockdown has to be relaxed soon but it needs to be cautiously and with larger penalties for not complying because its been shown that people dont obey. The government could have started relaxing already - too soon in AND too late out are the mark of a government that cant organise a drink in a brewery.

The message has got through then and lockdown is working. The problems will pile up again when lockdown ends with the clinics and other treatments starting up again and Covid isn't going anywhere yet either.
A complete nightmare.

I dont think it's fair to claim that there was an overreaction though. It's easy to identify what capacity was needed with hindsight, but there was no way of knowing in advance. Better to over prepare than not, but striking the balance between capacity for COVID and non-covid patients was never going to be easy.

I’m assuming that some of the people on this thread don’t know anyone who has died of Covid. I know of three people, one of whom caught it in hospital whilst in for something else, and I know someone else who is ventilated and fighting for his life. This thread trivialises that and makes it seem like it’s all been a big overreaction- try telling that to the families of the people who’ve died.

Well said.

I don’t think we overreacted either as we needed to prepare capacity. We need to respond to the current situation though. Redeploy doctors and nurses. Some hospitals shouldn’t be struggling whilst others empty and people shouldn’t be dying at home while beds lay empty.

The government needs to be quicker to react to the ever changing situation.

By all accounts, London has been badly affected. As usual, it appears nowhere else matters

I agree.
I really wish people would stop saying London is ahead of everywhere else, or has more cases.
Yes London has been badly affected but by percent of population, other places have often been ahead or had more cases. Birmingham and Sheffield for example.

I’m assuming that some of the people on this thread don’t know anyone who has died of Covid

^ Not me ... I also know people (tested) who’ve recovered. I know HCPs working on the absolute frontline (King’s A&E), back room planners, ppl who’ve been redeployed, people who have very little clinical work - filling their time with CPD. Friends in the private sector who’ve had their clinics & hospitals cleared for the NHS literally doing nothing. Older family members who’ve been asked to return to practice.

I still don’t think it is okay for the NHS to grind to a stop for covid. We are protecting no one by preventing people accessing care & protect the NHS is a fucking stupid slogan.

I really wish people would stop saying London is ahead of everywhere else

London is ahead though, time wise. It's been on a steady downward for 7 days whereas other parts of the UK haven't.

That's why the "end lockdown" stuff is going to get louder and louder and louder because a lot of people don't care that Lanarkshire or Sheffield or whatever haven't peaked yet and are still struggling.