Nurse critically injured with life changing injury after being stabbed by a patient

[Ohthedaffodils]

She was just going about her work - what on earth has this country become.
Happened at The Royal Oldham Hospital.

Shocked but not surprised. All public facing staff get this. I’m on a charity helpline so people have actively chosen to call and we occasionally get abuse. We help with benefits and can hear the aggression some people feel when talking about job centre staff who also need security.

Shout out for pharmacists - I get regular prescriptions. Mine also hands out merhadone and I’ve been there at the time and some are quite aggressive. They also get abused if they don’t have a drug in stock. I know how frustrating that is and scary if you need it urgently but abuse will not change that.

Our emergency services workers are assaulted and abused every day and it's disgusting. Whether you are a nurse, doctor, police officer, fireman/woman or paramedic no one signs up to these jobs to be injured by a member of the public, they do it to help people.

I wish the CPS and court system would take these assaults on emergency workers more seriously.

I was about to make the parallel here.

Absolutely horrific what nurses have to deal with. That part is no surprise, but the part about the staff member themselves having to make the complaint (and being pressured not to) is shocking. We excuse it in education because the perpetrators are minors. I really thought a zero tolerance policy against violent patients assaulting HCPs would be enforced, not just empty words.

Also, not to make it only about gender, but I think the genderised workforce in schools, hospitals and carers is an element in society treating them with absolute contempt.

I thought the 'key workers' thing might actually unlock some recognition in society for those on the front line caring for others. Nope.

I agree- but I always thought that assaulting a police officer was taken really seriously, as a deterrent? Is that really swept under the carpet too?

The NHS needs military intervention.

Every time me or my son visit our local hospital all the staff, without exception, are the kindest, friendliest, most professional and wonderful people and we feel totally safe and looked after.
We feel really lucky and are so grateful.

I can't help thinking the people that do this kind of thing are probably experiencing mental health crisis? Or are intoxicated in some way?
Not that's an excuse - but paramedic and hospital staff need better protection from people in these states. They are so exposed at the moment.

What a scumbag, I bet there was fuck all wrong with him too. I was in a&e recently for hours after an accident and yes its shit, but all I could think was how lucky I was that i can go and get treatment at any time of the day or night, because of all of those dedicated people that have spent years training to help others. As patients we only spend a few hours there and we moan about it, but the staff are working there in difficult conditions day in and day out, I don't know how they do it.

I’ve spent a heck of a lot of time in Oldham Royal Hospital with various relatives over the past five years. Many times queueing in corridors for days. I’ve seen the staff cope with so much abuse. Often drug or alcohol related.

Many nurses have scissors in their top pocket. This person could have snatched them. 😢

Knife crime in this country need's to be taken more seriously.
Forget the sob stories in court rough upbringing blah,blah.
Lots of us had shit childhoods etc but have never found the need to attack anyone let alone take a knife into a hospital.

Just read the scissors comment,the intent to wound is still there and how is that going to get you seen quicker?

It's always been horrendous. As a ward sister I got chased one night by a man wielding a bottle at my head. He was hypoxic but when security finally came they sauntered in hands in pockets. Somehow female lives don't matter! We also had to contend with gropey male consultants who also felt we mattered so little that they could get away with sexual assault.

Unfortunately so so common, our a&e nurses wear body cams. I had a patient I was anaesthetising who was under police escort, took him hitting me on the head with his plaster cast 3x, before they actually cuffed him rather than just repeating "don't do that". I've had our security refuse to attend pts that have previously attacked their security guards so just told to ring 999 and stay away. Crazy world we are in

Ban him from the hospital for life.

This is just appalling. What the fuck is wrong with people? And please don’t someone from the Be Kind Brigade pop up and say, “oh but they are ill”. Fucking savages = withdrawal of automatic healthcare. How ironic that we regard it as a sign of our society’s civility that we allow people in front line roles to have their heads kicked in by unemployed smack heads.

I was attacked three times during a year while nursing, one patient just started a fight, the second threatened me with a knife and the third threw a fire extinguisher at me. The culmination of events lead to me having a breakdown, and eventually being retired due to ill health from a job I loved. That was over 25yrs ago, so nothing new in healthcare staff being assaulted during the course of their work.

Echoing all the above comments, this is nothing new. Dealing with violence and aggression is a part of nursing training. It shocked me as a student that it was such a prominent part of the course. 13 years later nothing really shocks me any more. I was talking about this with colleagues today and we all had stories of varying severity.

@toffeeappleturnip Intoxication, mental health crisis, dementia, extreme stress, fear... Yes these can all be contributing factors but not always.

Yes it's not new, I remember my partners shock when he got issued with a stab vest 20 odd years ago.

This does happen.
Patients do get banned, it's a lengthy process though.

I'm a Paramedic, I believe all ambulance trusts have body worn cameras now, although the wearing of them isn't mandatory and in my trust, the uptake is sadly very low.

In 23 years I've been threatened, spat at and verbally abused more times than I care to remember. I've been squared up to, by 6ft+ guys - I'm 5ft 2".
I've been physically assaulted 3 times - punched in the face, had a chair swung at my back (it landed) and I've been bitten.

With the way things are at the moment, I'm not wholly surprised sadly.
My local EDs that I attend are akin to images of 3rd world healthcare.
Single bays with 2 or 3 patients in.
Corridors being used as 10 bed wards, treatment being given in corridors and waiting rooms as if it's BAU.

How we all laugh at the halcyon days of the 4 hour wait.....

This poor nurse, absolutely horrific, unfortunately within certain sectors in healthcare this kind of stuff is almost normalised.
I literally couldn't list the amount of assaults & injuries myself & colleagues have been subjected to over the years..
From sexual assault to getting thrown in front of a car, broken bones, bites, held hostage and absolutely anything else you can think of.
Add in short staffing & the risks are even higher.

Yep I've had a zimmer frame flung at me, dirty pads, a plant pot. I was the nurse responsible with a patient being looked after by 2 staff at all times who woke up and immediately put his arms around one of my colleagues neck. He had taken a dodgy batch of valium and needed to be sedated and intubated in ICU until he got it out his system because he was such a danger to staff. I remember sitting with a patient while I was pregnant and he jumped in and grabbed his IV pole (about an inch thick metal bar) and bent it at 90 degrees and told me he would do it to my neck if I didn't f* off. I've had multiple windows smashed, one with a pump attached to the patient.

Violence and aggression isn't a rare occurrence, it's every day. I completely appreciate that people are unwell and in pain and exhausted and frustrated after a long wait though in reality the nurses on the floor have literally no power over any of that and are trying to do the best they can in an impossible situation. I am a mum and a wife who should be able to come home safe to my family after a shift.

When I worked in theatres, I was always advised to make sure I had an exit route away from the relatives/patient if I was delivering news of delayed surgery. Never get backed in a corner, etc. Frustrated people do things they could never imagine doing in the cold light of day.

All so fucking terrible. So sorry to all the NHS frontline colleagues who have to face this shit day in day out.

It's shocking that these incidents are so widespread but so little focus in the general media. Yet the stupid public were all hitting their saucepans and clapping like idiots. This country is genuinely in the shit.

I’m an AHP, I’ve never been punched but I’ve been shouted at, sexually assaulted, pushed, threatened, had a knife held to my throat, the most disturbing was someone who wrote a letter to the place I worked saying he would wait for me outside the unit till I was going to my car then take me back to his flat and make a lampshade out of my skin. That was because I didn’t give my surname when I answered the phone.

I worked in psych and the pressure not to report is amazingly high. I adopted a no tolerance approach and reported everything - but amazingly, in a psych hospital, our patients were rarely as aggressive as being reported here. They were on their best behaviour to get out.