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?

@mellongoose

I know this will trigger many people on here, but the issue is not money. Those in charge of our hospital repeatedly say they 'are awash with funding " at the moment and have been throughout the pandemic.

The issue is staffing. It cannot be solved by throwing yet more cash at it.

Pandemic started 2 years ago, money pays for training, higher wages, re instate the student bursary, gets us more training places.

These AHP's would now be half way through their degrees now.

Unfortunately, we didn't do any of this, even triggering Brexit so even more EU nationals left the NHS.

EU nationals went back home because of covid not Brexit. Nearly 6m EU nationals can live and work in th U.K. but many cannot travel back because of covid restrictions in their own country.

The NHS has enough money. The Trusts know this. It takes time to train staff and this is the issue.

@mellongoose

EU nationals went back home because of covid not Brexit. Nearly 6m EU nationals can live and work in th U.K. but many cannot travel back because of covid restrictions in their own country.

The NHS has enough money. The Trusts know this. It takes time to train staff and this is the issue.

Are you sure the issue isn't spaffing money on management consultants rather than nurses?

Nightingales were just there in case the NHS was completely overwhelmed and they needed somewhere to put thousands of dying people, providing very basic care, rather than letting them die in the street. Thank God they weren’t needed, just as the temporary morgue tents in London parks etc weren’t needed. It’s easy to forget that things could actually have been a great deal worse than they have been and, right at the start, nobody knew what we were dealing with.

@Stompythedinosaur

It is very insulting to suggest that the army can adequately step in to provide medical care that professions spend years training for.

We don't have enough nurses or doctors to safely provide care in the hospitals we have, and both professions have further staff leaving in swathes.

You do realise that "the army" has it's own doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, etc., which are trained "in house"?

One of my friends trained to become a dentist through the armed forces.

You're not talking about re-training a soldier to become a doctor - people go into the forces solely to train to become a doctor.

RoomOfRequirementWTAF!!!! How dare you!!! Don't you dare blame patients for this! It's attitudes like yours that prevent the NHS from taking a long hard look at itself and accepting that it isn't providing the standard of care it should be. That's not patients fault! GP surgeries need to accept the situation as it is and find safe solutions which don't leave vulnerable people to suffer

@Dobbysgotthesocks you still are not getting it. Shocking. There are not enough GPs to provide that standard of care - it's one of the reasons they are leaving! They ARE putting solutions into place to try to help it - such as triage and phone and video consults where appropriate to see more people but you're still not happy. What you want doesn't exist, but it is not because of current GPS.

Don't you think instead of blaming each other health care providers and patients should both be blaming austerity and 11 years of governing that's decimated the NHS and screwed everyone over?

@user333334 I've never voted Tory in my life and actually the career I've moved to is working against them.

But regardless it would be completely naive to assume that patients spouting the nonsense in this thread doesn't reach GPs and their staff and affect retention. I promise you it does. Instead of attacking those actually at fault they blame the staff actually still working for being lazy and refusing to work. It's so, so stupid.

Nice bit of patient blaming there.

@Badbadbunny I left the NHS so I don't have to care about what patients think - as evidenced in this thread they don't know what they're talking about.

Actually @RoomOfRequirement it's you who are not getting it! When another professional calls a Gp on behalf of a patient and explicitly tells them that they need to SEE the patient and that sending more photos won't show the severity of the problem. Then they HAVE A DUTY OF CARE to that patient to act!
13 fucking weeks we have been trying to get the GP go take responsibility and it was only when they were threatened with CQC that they arranged a district nurse to come out! And guess what she now has to have daily visits from them to redress it! If it had been seen 12 weeks ago it would have been healed by now!

Nursing degrees used to be funded by the NHS a few years ago. This was removed and students were asked to pay own tuition fees. Not sure if this is case now?
Didn’t seem a particularly bright move at the time. If you want people to come into NHS - make studying attractive and pay people to do it.
It would also be a great help to keep the staff you have. Whatever your views on vaccinations ‘No jab, no job’ for NHS and care workers seems to be a luxury we can’t afford.

@Dobbysgotthesocks

Actually *@RoomOfRequirement* it's you who are not getting it! When another professional calls a Gp on behalf of a patient and explicitly tells them that they need to SEE the patient and that sending more photos won't show the severity of the problem. Then they HAVE A DUTY OF CARE to that patient to act! 13 fucking weeks we have been trying to get the GP go take responsibility and it was only when they were threatened with CQC that they arranged a district nurse to come out! And guess what she now has to have daily visits from them to redress it! If it had been seen 12 weeks ago it would have been healed by now!

You're almost there - go deeper. WHY did that happen? Do you think every GP at that practice thought 'I just don't want to see this person I'm going to drink this tea and play sudoku instead'

Or, more likely, do you think GPs are getting more referrals than ever, all while having less staff working than ever? To you, this was one very very important patient, to the GPs there are thousands of people needing their attention and not enough staff or hours to get it all done.

I have no idea why you're so intent on blaming the individuals already seeing hundreds and hundreds of people a week, rather than a system which has become so unattractive no one wants to do the job anymore? And is it any wonder why?

Such a shame that the BMA rejected plans to increase the number of training positions and outright rejected plans for new medical schools. Anyone could be excused for thinking they didn't want too many new doctors as that may jeopardise their monopoly and bargaining position.

www.bmj.com/content/337/bmj.a748

@mellongoose

EU nationals went back home because of covid not Brexit. Nearly 6m EU nationals can live and work in th U.K. but many cannot travel back because of covid restrictions in their own country.

The NHS has enough money. The Trusts know this. It takes time to train staff and this is the issue.

Lol! Thats not what CHs, Care Agencies and NHS trusts say.

Trusts do not have enough money, what on earth are you talking about? even the Govt acknowledges this.

Time? agree, which why its such a shame we have wasted 2 years of it.

@CalamariGames

A giant white elephant, I think they planned to staff them with retired nurses dentists and veterinarians if I remember correctly.

They also planned to requisition ventilators from veterinary surgeries as they were concerned there weren't enough ventilators

Staff. They didn’t know how to staff them when they were being built, never mind now. I think it was all for show.

However our local one is being used as a vaccination centre

@RoomOfRequirement no I don't think the GP had any intentions of seeing the patient. I don't care why. They tried at every opportunity to fob us off. Including trying to tell me a wound wasn't currently infected from looking at a two week old photo.
I get that they are busy. I do. I really really do. But that doesn't mean that they can absolve themselves of their duty of care to their patients. Part of that is listening and comprehending what they are being told both from the patient and other professionals. All I wanted was a referral to the district nurses - who funnily enough DO have capacity to deal with it. But instead they did everything possible to prevent my client getting treatment.
Ultimately the GP system is broken. No it's no the fault of individual GPs but suggesting it's the patients fault is beyond a joke!

Nightingales were just there in case the NHS was completely overwhelmed and they needed somewhere to put thousands of dying people, providing very basic care, rather than letting them die in the street
It is not an either or situation though, it wasn't in a nightingale hanger or the streets. People were shipped back out to nursing homes for that care instead, to die and not only die, but pass it around to others to die. The. Nightingales were not equipped to give care, they were not up and running ready to do that, they were not fit for purpose, unless it was a morgue.

Thank God they weren’t needed
Again, they weren't needed as we were shipping people back out of hospitals once they got to capacity to make space for the new cases. The burden was passed back out into society.

just as the temporary morgue tents in London parks etc weren’t needed

The temporary morgues that built in London was not at a cost of millions of pounds. One was on an industrial estate because capacity had already been hit in the morgue so was a need then, not an in case, it was thrown up and used.

It’s easy to forget that things could actually have been a great deal worse than they have been and, right at the start, nobody knew what we were dealing with

It's not easy to forget how bad things actually were either or how much better things could have been had things been handled differently with the knowledge we had at the time.

Nightingales were put together after all that horrible footage from Italy came out. We couldn’t risk the old and vulnerable bring literally left to rot. We had to build in capacity for a virus we knew nothing about.
As it was,the NHS could cope.

Do we know how many are going in to hospital with actual Covid problems?

@Badbadbunny

Dentists train at UK University dental schools, they do not train to be dentists in the army. That is nonsense.
3 in my year at University, went into the army after gaining BDS. All 3 had been undergraduate members of the Officer Training Core, and received some sort of stipend.

Not read the thread... but it is a joke that they were put up with the knowledge that there was no staff to run them.
Total waste of money and resources.

Use the to get the homeless off the streets.

@StoneofDestiny

Use the to get the homeless off the streets.

That would be tricky as most of them no longer exist.

The London Nightingale was at the Excel Centre which is back in operation as a conference venue. Can't see them altruistically opening their doors to house the homeless this winter.

Were they not basically going to be places people were just sent to die?
There aren't enough doctors and nurses to actually provide a proper level of care in more hospitals.

Our local one is full. Of children. It was a school sports hall, repurposed in lockdown.

Could you work in one? If you have the skills please volunteer. If you don't have the skills to turn, intubate and care for a ventilated patient then whi should anyone else with no medical training?

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

I’m embarrassed for you op please stop.
And hope it never gets to the point where we have to find out.

@lastrolo10

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

I’m embarrassed for you op please stop.
And hope it never gets to the point where we have to find out.

Covid affects the whole system... therefore you need people with knowledge of the whole system to treat them. And all the organ systems are interlinked. You need someone with proper medical knowledge. Is all well and good to use the army if it is just recording obs or turning people... but they need to know what all the numbers mean and what to do if they are unusual.