Hospital outbreaks killed both my grandparents

[littlepieces]

Both my lovely grandparents have died from Covid in this second wave. They hadn't left the house since March, we've been so careful. Then my grandmother got an infection late last year and had to be treated in hospital. She was there just over a week, doing well, and then she picked up Covid and died. A couple of months later my granddad had a bad fall and had to be checked out at hospital. We were terrified for him. He ended up staying for 10 days, also picked up Covid, and died. I can't believe this happened twice in just a few months, we feel like we sent our grandad to his death. I can't believe how incredibly cruel this situation is.

I am so sorry for your loss. My Nan had a fall and had to go to hospital and contracted the virus there. She got through it but then had to go back into hospital for something else and was just so weak, she passed away there. I am still heartbroken that I never got to say goodbye and always think if only the fall hadn't happened 😞

It is an impossible situation but I know from having managed a team of therapists based in A&E that it is often very hard to get patients discharged quickly even when they no longer need medical care. This situation will only improve with more commitment from families and less expectation that the NHS and community services are totally responsible. With elderly frail people, hospitals, even pre Covid, are high risk environments but often families seem to think they are the safest place. I have seen several threads just this week with people moaning that relatives were discharged home too quickly. It is a rare situation to have a family member say they will take a week off work to settle and care for a parent when they are discharged but often this is what is required. In hospital patients can appear very disorientated and unable to manage but for a large proportion of those people, back in home environment they settle quickly, but if they live alone, we often cannot risk that. The amount of times I have wished a family member would just offer to stay a few nights( with a back up plan in place in case it all went wrong)
The other thing that happens a lot is people get less and less able to manage at home and rather than sorry these issues, it seems that families wait for a hospital admission and then tell us all the issues that have been going on for years and state that we cannot possibly discharge the patient back to that situation. It is so frustrating to work on a discharge team and see so many beds occupied by people who do not need medical care but whose discharge is effectively blocked by family. I would hope threads like this will at least help people realise that when you think your relative is being thrown out of hospital too soon, it is because those of us who work there know that even pre Covid, hospitals are dangerous places for vulnerable people to be. Mainly because they are full of sick people.

What vdbfamily said.

Plus;
This virus is very easily transmitted. More than most other diseases known to humankind.

Hospitals know full well what is required to prevent the spread but space and staffing levels make that nigh on impossible. They don’t have space for isolation pods. One hospital in the south has needed to staff a waiting ambulances with an emergency department consultant actually allocated to ambulances on each shift.

Most healthcare staff outside those performing aerosol generating procedures have less than ideal PPE. A plastic apron is a very small shield against a dragon.

In some areas care homes and care agencies are refusing to take patients after hospital. Some areas already had too few care homes and care agency places. Step down is a real issue.

The nosocomial rates in hospitals are monitored daily and action taken if rates rise too high. There are outbreaks but nowhere near as many as this thread suggests. Of course it’s tragic when frail elderly people die from the virus, particularly if it were potentially avoidable. Most hospitals are managing the situation incredibly well with few outbreaks.

I'm so sorry littlepieces, I can't imagine what you're going through

@BigWoollyJumpers

On isolation pods OP, the simple answer is that there would be no space. Capacity is already reduced to beds being distanced beyond what they would usually be. If you implemented isolation for all Covid patients we would be turning away thousands of patients.

The cost of the Nightingales could have created many isolation pods, or at least anything better than an open bay, even just the plastic partitions we see at the supermarket. It's not about cost. The government simply do not care about infection control. High as a kite on behavioural control but they don't actually care about the rest of it.

There are many patients in hospital, having caught it in the community, who were given no anti viral drugs earlier on.

GPs have effectively been removed from the whole process by government edict.

I cannot believe people are not more angry about this and instead shout about who is going to see their friends.

littlepieces I am sorry I got caught up in the debate and did not say how sorry I was for you losing 2 precious grandparents. We have seen absolutely heartbreaking situations with several members of same family passing away and elderly patients trying to fight Covid and being told their spouse has died. It really is a terrible situation. I am putting a lot of hope in vaccinations as I think Covid is here to stay but will affect us all far less when those at high risk of hospitalisation are vaccinated.

I'm so sorry for your losses.

A family member's brother (59) died after contracting Covid in hospital. He went in for something else, was placed on a ward with Covid and then sadly died after being discharged.

@whippettiger

I’m so sorry, that’s so awful

I wish they would add more context to the daily death figures released and give some indication of where they died, or where infections are coming from etc. Because sadly I think care homes and hospitals are driving a considerable amount.

they don't add the context because they don't want you to know the details anything that makes them look bad they will try to hide it for as long as they can

The government simply do not care about infection control
The government want to privatise the NHS so that they can give lucrative contracts to their wealthy backers
The pandemic shines a light on the NHS and now we can all see it needs to be properly funded and provisioned, health care workers need to be treated like the important people that they are.
All this works directly against the long-term goals and aims of the conservative government, they are doing everything they can to switch off that light and distract us.

the same happened to my great-grandad. he went into hospital after a mild heart attack and was released a week later with covid. quite a few family members ended up catching it and then my grandad and uncle both died from it. my great-grandma is still suffering with long covid and badly struggling with her mental health after losing her husband and son within two days of each other.

I am really sorry for all those who have lost family and friends to covid. And all of you who’ve lost someone through hospital transmission.

My elderly, but living independently at home, neighbour also had a fall, was taken to hospital, caught Covid and died.

@Yohoheaveho

The government simply do not care about infection control The government want to privatise the NHS so that they can give lucrative contracts to their wealthy backers The pandemic shines a light on the NHS and now we can all see it needs to be properly funded and provisioned, health care workers need to be treated like the important people that they are. All this works directly against the long-term goals and aims of the conservative government, they are doing everything they can to switch off that light and distract us.

This old chestnut is getting really old now. It is simply not true. If you look at all the long term plans for the NHS, which were drawn up and agreed by cross party committees with input from NHS users, you would not trot out this line. You can also look up Kings Fund or Nuffield reports, or Fact Check reports for the true picture. Look up NHS Long Term Plan.

So sorry to everyone affected by this.

@BigWoollyJumpers
Ok ok I consider my wrists thoroughly slapped -sorry🙏
but what is the explanation for the debacle of the nightingale hospitals?
Why don't we have enough NHS staff? Why did they withdraw the bursary for student nurses? Why do nurses not get proper pay?

I had a work colleague in pre-covid days who caught MRSA in hospital. Nearly died and was left disabled and unable to work again. When my Dad was in hospital years ago it was filthy. He couldn't feed himself and his food was just cleared away. He would have starved to death if we hadn't taken food in and fed him ourselves.

The NHS is an inefficient bottomless pit that no amount of funding will fix. It needs a major re-think.

Yes I know it is a tiny detail in the grand picture of things but I was often somehow forgotten when it came to giving out meals and I was in my late 20s so was fully aware I had missed my dinner and could ask for it. I'm sure a lot of elderly people who got forgotten might not have realised they hadn't been fed, or might not have wanted to bother the staff to ask.

It was also dreadful food. Stuff like corned beef white bread sandwiches, mince and grey mash and boiled swede. Awful. My DH used to bring in food to me. I know the budget is tiny but I'm sure better choices could be made.

I agree that funding is only part of it. There are so many inefficiencies and poor management.

In terms of staffing, Covid is also adding to the problem. I have a fairly well staffed team of therapists but our of a team of 5 OT'S and 2.5 assistants on our medical wards, this last 2 weeks I have had a senior OT and a senior OT assistant off isolating with mild/ asymptomatic Covid picked up by lateral flow test, an OT assistant who was Track and Traced and told to stay home 10 days. On another team we have an OT who has a child sent home having been exposed in a class so she cannot work and I have another staff member highly vulnerable who is sheilding again. Fortunately( if you can look at it that way) most of my team of clinicians have now had Covid( all mildly thank God) so from Monday I am hoping will will not continue with such low levels but we then may have to help out sister hospital as they are more poorly staffed so that again will stretch is thin. If you add together actual Covid, track and trace, sheilding staff, pregnant non patient facing staff and those with young children off school isolating, it does not leave you with much. Not to mention exhausted staff who need to take A/ L occasionally.

I'm so sorry for all of you who have lost relatives in this way.
I would like to say though that MIL (92) has been hospitalised 3 times since last March. On the 1st occasion she went for a scan in Out Patients due to leg pain. It was discovered she had fractured her hip so she was sent to A&E from where she was admitted to a ward for surgery. 1 week after the Op she was sent to an NHS rehab unit before returning home. Her 2nd admission was by ambulance to A&E and 1 night on a ward. The following week she was admitted again with pneumonia and was in for a few days. She has never tested positive for Covid (and she was tested multiple times) so clearly some hospitals are doing better than others - for which we are extremely grateful.

[quote Yohoheaveho]@BigWoollyJumpers
Ok ok I consider my wrists thoroughly slapped -sorry🙏
but what is the explanation for the debacle of the nightingale hospitals?
Why don't we have enough NHS staff? Why did they withdraw the bursary for student nurses? Why do nurses not get proper pay?[/quote]
Ha ha ha - No, honestly, don't worry, it is just DH does a lot of work for the NHS, and we have lived and breathed it, from the outside, for most of our married lives. It becomes a bit of a life goal .

Absolutely agree that it is far from perfect, and has many flaws. Many historical factors feed into reluctance to change. I honestly think the next generation of medics and politicians will push change. In an odd way, the pandemic has helped in this, in that practices have had to evolve in order to met the many challenges. Soap box... I will stop.

Nightingales were a political decision as much as a medical one. Lots of pressure to do "something", copy other countries. Also at the start it was anticipated that thousands of patients would be inert on ventilators, that very quickly became clear that was not the case.

Staff is a European and indeed worldwide problem. There are not enough trained medical staff in the world to cover the populations need. When we take from another country, that country suffers. The bursary probably needed to be retained, perhaps in a slightly different form. Interestingly though, this year has seen a huge rise in applicants for nursing, social care and paramedic training despite no financial assistance. Medical places have also been increased, but still fall behind demand.

Pay is tricky. In a global market the UK is not the highest payer, but is in line with most in the EU, Germany for example is about parity. I think the real issue is more to do with working conditions (not pension, holidays etc, which are good), but general day to day working conditions. These will not improve until staff shortages are addressed. A Catch 22 position.

I am currently in hospital with sepsis and have been here since Monday.

It is a very scary place to be at the moment and I am terrified of getting Covid in here as I know my body will not be able to fight it. I am not well enough or strong enough.

How awful. I'm really worried for my nan who is currently in hospital with a blood clot. She's only 80 but hasn't been in good shape for a long time and has dementia.

I'm so sorry it ended up being the absolute worst for you and your family OP. My condolences

@vdbfamily Thanks for coming back to follow up your comment with some kind words. There was agreement from everyone that my grandad needed to go into care. We got him a place at a small, private care home which was happy to take him immediately, but he got stuck in social services red tape, further delayed by the Christmas period when everyone disappeared on leave for weeks. He could have been safely discharged a few days after he went in. In my grandad's case, this outcome was totally avoidable. Incidentally, the hospital he was at was one of the most overwhelmed in the country at the time he was there and suffering staff shortages - it was frustrating to know he was blocking a bed but there was nothing we could do.

Frontline staff are doing the best they can despite the staff shortages, of course. And not forgetting that these staff are also at risk. Yet the hospital system doesn't seem to have learned anything or adapted to this at all in almost a year now to reduce infection risk. Ok, so maybe vulnerable people are always at more risk in hospital, but when you also have young people catching it there and dying in droves, that's a huge problem that needs addressing.

@BigWoollyJumpers- thank you for taking the time to explain, very informative!
@Bella-so sorry you are so poorly, how are you doing?
@Lubey-I hope your Nan is as comfortable as she can be, this must be so upsetting for you

Equally, in the interests of balance, DP's 82yo grandfather had a hip replacement in October and was fine after a five day stay. My best friend had a c section in November and was on the ward for a week, and was totally fine. I'm not suggesting everyone will go into hospital and never leave, but hospital transmission is clearly a huge problem and significant factor in the spread of the virus, yet doesn't seem much change or progression is happening in that space.

Add my brother in law to the list. Mid 70s, mild heart attack before Christmas, sent home to recover, got pneumonia back to hospital, just getting on top of the pneumonia, caught covid and died on Monday.

My poor sister. They let her see him briefly before he died and now her children are scared stiff she's caught it.