To think we just need to use the nightingale hospitals?

[Mummamama]

The (seven I think) nightingale hospitals that were built last year precisely for COVID have barely been used. Why can we not just set these up again and transfer COVID patients to them freeing up normal hospitals for usual things? My understanding was the army was going to he used to staff them, why can this not happen now??
I understand the importance of not overwhelming the NHS but there doesn't seem to be an end game plan anymore, we can't keep having restrictions forever. At some point surely everyone will get COVID and it seems you can get it multiple times. Is it not better then to use our resources to enable the NHS to cope with the inevitable rather than spending huge amounts on lockdowns?

How do you plan to staff them?

Because we don’t have unlimited people to staff the hospitals and people are still getting sick of other things?

@RockallMalinHebrides

How do you plan to staff them?

However they planned to staff them last year I guess.

Would you be willing to work there?

‘The army’ seem to be used as the solution for everything. I think they are probably busy doing their normal jobs. They can’t staff hospitals when they are not doctors or nurses.

The army can’t “staff” them in the usual sense… they were never meant to be actual hospitals. They were places where we could ventilate people and provide a basic level of care. Not the type of place you’d want to be admitted personally, with Covid or otherwise.

I believe why they were never used is partly demand, but also no magic extra Drs and nurses.

Hospitals are bursting at the seams due to a breakdown in social care. Thousands of elderly people who are fit for discharge but need care are stuck. I’d be looking at converting the Nightingales into halfway care centres but as pp says, how do you staff them? I’m sure the army has limited capacity and it’s not a short term problem.

Where are we going to get the staff to staff the places.

The plan last year was to generate enough staff by redeployment of those doing elective work/outpatient stuff. If we continue the elective work/outpatient stuff there won’t be extra staff for the Nightingales

They were hardly used because they were a shit idea and there was nobody to staff them in the first place. More the staffing situation in the NHS is even worse so..........

It’s not just the drs and nurses though.

It’s equipment. It’s physios. It’s OTs. It’s x ray and CT machines. It’s cleaning facilties.

I could go on and on but a hospital is much more than a building and doctors and nurses

@RockallMalinHebrides

How do you plan to staff them?

Army! That's what the plan was last year. I know they won't all have much medical knowledge but if they are only treating COVID surely it's not going to take a 7 year medical degree to learn the ins and outs of every possible condition

no staff
waste of money
GPs actually seeing patients would take huge pressure off hospitals
We locked down to protect the NHS, our reward was the NHS has abandoned us

Because they weren’t fit for purpose and a huge government politics exercise oh look what we can do.

Truth was they don’t have everything you need to look after sick people : it’s not just about beds. The right equipment, labs, radiology, a wide volume of meds. Food? Communications, IT for records/documentation just for starters

Oh and staff: My trust can’t staff the shifts in the hospital it’s dire. If it sent patients to the nightingale it needed to send staff not just nurses are needed: doctors, HCA, physio, radiology, pharmacy and so on. Not enough staff to do this anywhere. You can’t staff it on volunteers or retired staff either it’s not that logistically simple.

How on earth can 'the army' staff them?

Have I missed something or are all army personnel medically trained?

@Mummamama

RockallMalinHebrides
"How do you plan to staff them?
Army! That's what the plan was last year. I know they won't all have much medical knowledge but if they are only treating COVID surely it's not going to take a 7 year medical degree to learn the ins and outs of every possible condition"

If you were so poorly you required ventilation would you want a qualified experienced nurse, or would you be happy with anyone irrespective of whether they were actually able to do the job?

“only treating covid”. Jesus wept OP.

Given the high transmissibility of omicron, would there be any value in using them - staffed by taking from normal hospitals because there's no other source - to reduce the spread within the latter? Staffing in the normal departments will be impacted if more of them are off with CV.

I'd assumed that, rather than just capacity, was some of the rationale for creating them.

@milly74

no staff waste of money GPs actually seeing patients would take huge pressure off hospitals We locked down to protect the NHS, our reward was the NHS has abandoned us

It’s not abandoned anyone it’s literally collapsing because of years of underfunding followed a badly managed pandemic.

The plan was army PLUS redeployment staff. If you want to have the hospitals running as usual there will be no redeployment staff, and yes, it still takes a very long time to learn how to adequately care for people with covid (because, remember those sick enough for a hospital bed usually also have other serious medical conditions).

Maybe I’m missing something, but weren’t a lot of the Nightingale hospitals converted exhibition centres or similar? Won’t they be in use for their original purposes now?

Because they were a government gimmick.

Covid patients that need hospitalisation encounter a raft of problems, this is an incredibly naive thing to say.

Why did they ever waste our money to build them if they were never going to be used

Maybe not a quick solution then, but even if it means more time to train staff to work in them and offer them better pay surely that would be a saving over continual lockdowns?