So much chat about schools, why is no one looking at the NHS?

[headachehenry]

So much ripping apart of the plans to get schools back with different measures, what education will look like from now on, etc - understandable. I'm really surprised that no one is asking questions about the NHS in a covid world.

I'm in therapies in a role where I need to touch and examine patients in order to assess, diagnose and treat patients. We've been told that we won't be allowed to offer face to face for 18 months and can only treat people over the phone or in virtual appointments - conditions can not get diagnosed this way. Colleagues are having to talk parents through doing procedures on themselves online, talk relatives through doing complex rehab over the phone, procedures we use for diagnostics are suspended long term, therapy assessments on small children being carried out remotely (challenging when they won't stay on camera). Many staff members told to plan to work from home (in unsuitable environments with lack of confidentiality with family members) indefinitely.

The NHS is not all about inpatient care (which remains) or elective surgery (which is all you ever hear about) - I'm really surprised that people aren't on here ripping NHS services to shreds. I'm embarrassed that it's clap night again because I feel ashamed at the service I'm able to offer from now on (I know it's not my fault, it's the covid NHS) and wish people would shout about it 😢

@user1497207191

We are not giving up on people, people need come to A&E if they need to even if 111 tell them not to.

If they come to A&E we WILL deal with them and help them like we have always done.

The link is a very sad story. The choice of prolonging someone’s life at the moment may go against them having further treatment at this point in time, his life may have been prolonged if circumstances were different. I don’t doubt this is very painful for his family and understand their anger and hurt.

This twisted reporting and those who want to make it political does not help especially those who are having their treatment put on hold which is worrying enough. This isn’t because they are not important or have been forgotten.

@Tiatotherescue The story linked to explains that the deceased wasn't being treated in A&E - it was planned treatment that was cancelled, leading to his death. We all know that we can still get emergency treatment in A&E, that's not what is being discussed here.

I am disgusted that the NHS threw old people who could have gone home into care homes where they have died or become more disabled. Clapping for the NHS empty wards! I think everyone in healthcare Is worried about people who need treatment which they are not getting. Falls, visual impairment, chronic conditions deteriorating, deaths.
The focus after this should be on social care and a National Care Service.

I’ve only read first page but I guess this means I won’t getting my Autism assessment?

Nearly 2 years of waiting before COVID.

My doctor and my family all think I have HFA but until I have a diagnosis I don’t feel like I can be open about it or what I need - I feel like a fraud.

@Ritasueandbobtoo9 unfortunately domiciliary care was privatised many moons ago and I can't see that changing.

A problem in my area was that a lot of the homecare providers stopped taking on new patients, understandbly, as a lot were effected by staffing issues due to Covid. I am not sure how widespread this issue was across the UK though ?

The care home scandal is a direct consequence of the decisions made in March to move vulnerable patients from hospitals into care homes without testing them for Covid. The lethal consequences of this need to be exposed. The architects of this policy need to be held accountable. This is from the Sunday Times.

^about five weeks ago the manager of one of my care homes called me. “I’m being absolutely hounded”, he said, “because I’m refusing to take a resident back who has tested positive in hospital.”
The hospital’s discharge manager — followed by the consultant —had rung my manager at home on a Sunday, and both had said: “You have to take them back. You have a duty of care to take this resident back.” And this is where I think everything went wrong. On March 17, Sir Simon Stevens, the NHS chief executive, said hospitals had to get 90,000 beds cleared, so they needed to get 30,000 people out. So they sent patients with no tests into care homes. They said: “We don’t need tests — you’ve just got to take them.”Well, I’ve now got two homes with Covid-19. We can trace it. In both homes it came from residents bringing the virus from hospital. So when the manager of another of my homes rang to tell me he’d refused, I said categorically, “Well done.” That home has 90 beds, and to this day it is still Covid-free.The government was asleep at the wheel. We were sent a public health document on March 13, which said that if any of our residents got significantly ill, they wouldn’t be allowed into hospital and would have to die in their home. We’d never read anything like it. Elderly people weren’t a priority^

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/thanks-to-nhs-managers-ive-now-got-two-care-homes-infected-with-covid-19-xk2n8f6nx

I think the reason it doesn't cause thread after thread on MN is because it isn't controversial, everyone is in agreement. NHS staff desperately wants things to return as usual, I don't know any AHP who is enjoying this way of working. Most NHS staff are not afraid of the virus and want to return to caring for their patients. Therefore they agree, which I guess doesn't really make for long argumentative threads like what happens in anything related to schooling.

I think the reason for that is that AHP will be running clinics with PPE on and short close intervals of contact which is obviously much lower risk than running a full classroom all day. I have continued my clinics throughout as they are essential and have felt very safe to be honest.

We are told it is to reduce footfall in hospitals and health centres and because of a worry about having sufficient PPE. One clinic uses a lot of PPE. I don't know what the truth is behind it all but for sure, it is totally unacceptable.

PrivateD00r I agree everyone I know wants to resume to some form of normality. that we have to work differently that isn’t going to change anytime soon. It hasn’t made our work lives easier at all quite the opposite. It has created another layer of our already complex work. That won’t be the same for all areas. How they shall catch up with appointments/treatment/operations I don’t know. What a massive task so many factors to consider.

Bovary no one is going to or should defend the appalling decision made of discharging patients without being tested. It won’t be overlooked and shouldn’t be.

Should patients who no longer need to be in hospital who are are close to the end of their life be discharged (after testing negative) to a caring home. They often are in normal circumstances and receive palliative care in a more comfortable and peaceful setting. There is a lot of fear around patients being discharged at the moment (not just elderly).

Im not clapping either for the Nhs i feel very let down. If you havent got covid then your just meant to get on with it no matter what your going through. Im waiting for a referral to be done but just keep being told no refferals being accepted at the moment. To just know that my referral had been done and accepted would be something, knowing that i was then in the system to be seen. Another hospital appt i had this month has now been rescheduled for November.

Im not clapping either for the Nhs i feel very let down.
Whatever your feelings about NHS management in each trust, it is unfair to pass that internal dissatisfaction on to every doctor, nurse, paramedic, midwife, cleaner etc who are putting their own lives and mental health at risk caring for very unwell covid patients.

Frumpty - I know, I remember when most Dom care was in house! It was suppose to be better and cost less but has just been a poorer service with less training and a higher turnover of staff, which leads to risks to care worker and the people they care for.

I thought this was interesting.

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/17/hospital-patients-england-coronavirus-covid-19

Apparently, 20% of all people hospitalised for Covid-19, caught it whilst in hospital for another reason.

Well yes nellodee hospital transmission was inevitable It’s a very infectious illness and despite trying to separate Covid from non Covid, staff have been thwarted by insufficient testing and a test that doesn’t seem to be 100% reliable. At the beginning our hospital only had capacity to test 5 people a day!! And staff testing didn’t get going for weeks. Dh works on a non Covid ward, patients arrive supposedly non Covid, but he sees symptoms, tests them again and they are positive.

@MRex It is possible to be delighted by the individuals one has met but let down by the system as a whole. I've had that experience previously with the NHS (well before the current crisis). I would never be anything other than grateful to the individuals I meet who work in it. I don't clap for it though, because I think the system needs serious reform, and I'm not going to pretend to praise it. (And I don't really see how my clapping is supposed to help the people who work in it tbh.)

@110APiccadilly - that's good. To be fair, I don't know if it helps, but I feel it's to thank individuals for their sacrifice rather than a generic organisation thing.

Apparently, 20% of all people hospitalised for Covid-19, caught it whilst in hospital for another reason.

No surprise there. Hospitals have always been a hotbed for spread of disease etc. Just look at the amount of Norovirus cases over recent years where entire wards were quarantined. Infection control etc may be very stringent in ICU, Operating theatres, A&E, etc., but isn't really taken seriously in normal wards where staff merrily go from patient to patient without washing hands etc.

I wasn't meaning to criticise anyone working in a hospital. I think it just goes to show how hard it is to separate out Covid from non-Covid in that setting. I was also thinking how difficult it must be to weigh up the negatives of postponing surgeries with the risk of infecting patients.

High time we had an NHS bashing thread!