Unpaid jobseekers to deliver patient care in three hospitals.

[carernotasaint]

www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/may/21/unpaid-jobseekers-deliver-patient-care?CMP=twt_gu

I honestly can't see them passing on a vital task to temporary work experience.

It doesn't say what type of wards these people will be in. Maybe they'll pick the wards that don't have pre op, stroke victims etc.

yeeeahh they'll pick wards with lots of young healthy people who need no help there's lots of them!

there are elderly people on EVERY adult ward totem, many of which have swallowing/feeding issues

anyway, it does say the unions are unhappy with the patient care roles, so hopefully it'll get nipped in the bud, if its not it is franky naive to think there will always be enough support for the volunteers on the wards themselves to monitor and supervise them!

Slippery slope....................................says she who did her nurse training when nurse in charge dished out meals and feeding patients was seen as a very important job

If a task is considered a core nursing role it won't be passed on to the work experience.

Porters assist HCPs in their roles but they don't actually do the role. For example they ferry people to and from operating rooms, but they don't get involved with the ops. They are still considered to be assisting.

monkeymoma, hopefully they'll clarify what they expect and what will happen. Or cut out the parts the unions aren't happy with.

Porters have their own defined roles and are very clear on what they DO NOT do and what they need an escort for etc

Feeding DID get passed down to the lowest staff over recent years, so to say it'ld never happen, well! it did! it is now being prioritised a bit more but there are still wards where "protected mealtimes" are ignored and NBM patients DO get fed by temporary staff, and patients DO get the wrong consistancies

But at least the current temporary unqualified staff choose to be HCPs, want to be there, and USUALLY have some eperience or some kinda training, but it still goes wrong.

Please, tonight, get your OH to feed you your dinner without you speaking to them, and then tell me if you think it's okay for people with no previous interest in caring to do it! because if there is ANY scope for them to do it within the definition of their role, there are places where they will slip through the net and do so without proper supervision

see my earlier post about a new HCA being left alone to get on with feeding with fatal results!

I am presuming they will all be CRB checked ? I have some concerns with regards to patient confidentiality too . In some regards it might be a good thing if the people chosen have a genuine interest in working in the care sector , it may be a way for them to gain experience and possibly get a more permanent post in the hospital . I would hate the idea of people with no interest in working in this area being forced to deal with people when they are at their most vunerable .