Safe in our Hands

Generali

StevieJ wrote: »

So when do we start employing enough skilled nurses to cope with the workload?

The report is very clear. The problem was in part due to a lack of staff but it was also due to very low standards of work from the nurses that were employed.

In volume 3 of the report:

http://cdn.midstaffspublicinquiry.com/sites/default/files/report/Volume%203.pdf

for example pages 1500-1502, 1600-1605.

As the report says, the culture of the NHS has lack of candour, denial that there are problems, bullying and acceptance of poor behaviours at its heart. The NHS isn't providing what it should which is a baseline standard of care for its patients because the people that work in the NHS don't want to do it. That is the fault of the management, doctors and nurses.

I would be amazed if there is only one Trust that has these problems as my experience is that the NHS provides little or no care for patients that are unable to care for themselves.

vivatifosi

PaulF81 wrote: »

To be fair, I would expect there was a blame culture going on gen, combined with a "we don't air our dirty laundry in public mentality" that made whistle blowing nigh on impossible.

I bet one or two brave souls did though and were ignored.

I was listening to R4 on my way to work one day this week and found myself shouting at the radio like a madwoman (in spite of the mental image some may have of me, this is not a normal occurrence). On the radio was a whistleblower in a major NHS trust. They had gone public with their concerns over the system - due to concerns over patient safety - unfortunately though they had a gagging order on them. The person felt that their conscience meant that they had to speak - the NHS retalliated by threatening to sue and trying to clawback part of their settlement for sacking him.

MacMickster wrote: »

To our minds, the difference between the two wards was the expectations of standards between the people charged with running them.

For me, that inconsistency is a great part of the problem as you don't know what to expect. When I had my treatment for skin cancer, the hospital was fantastic. When my mum went into the same hospital to have breast cancer treatment in both breasts they put her on a general (mixed) ward not a specialist one as it was closed for the holidays, put her food in front of her and left it (she'd had both sides done so couldn't move either arm to feed herself) and got the dosage of her drugs wrong so she started hallucinating. Then after an outbreak of MRSA they discharged her early as they were concerned she was susceptible (which is all very well but inadequate follow up care).

Then my husband went into hospital for a hernia op, just as he was about to be anesthetised they started talking about removing his gall bladder - he told them that was the wrong op and they actually said it wasn't - so he argued with the doctors, got up and walked out in his surgical gown.

More recently, same trust, two female relatives had children in the same local hospital - both treated apallingly. One gave birth early. There was a sign up saying if you are going to bottle feed you must bring your own baby milk, but no understanding of babies being born prematurely and mum not being able to produce milk. The other had a c section, they wouldn't bring her breakfast so she had to go to the breakfast buffet with her drip and try to balance a tray on top of it.

Then this past Christmas my aunt fell over and hurt her ankle. Went to the local Urgent Care unit who xrayed it and said it was ok. Phoned her up 10 days later and said it was broken and was she walking on it.

My personal experience of the NHS has left me very wary of it and thinking it is rotten to the core, certainly in terms of my local NHS trust.

Generali wrote: »

I would be amazed if there is only one Trust that has these problems as my experience is that the NHS provides little or no care for patients that are unable to care for themselves.

Me too, for all of the reasons stated above.

lostinrates

vivatifosi wrote: »

I was listening to R4 on my way to work one day this week and found myself shouting at the radio like a madwoman (in spite of the mental image some may have of me, this is not a normal occurrence). On the radio was a whistleblower in a major NHS trust. They had gone public with their concerns over the system - due to concerns over patient safety - unfortunately though they had a gagging order on them. The person felt that their conscience meant that they had to speak - the NHS retalliated by threatening to sue and trying to clawback part of their settlement for sacking him.



For me, that inconsistency is a great part of the problem as you don't know what to expect. When I had my treatment for skin cancer, the hospital was fantastic. When my mum went into the same hospital to have breast cancer treatment in both breasts they put her on a general (mixed) ward not a specialist one as it was closed for the holidays, put her food in front of her and left it (she'd had both sides done so couldn't move either arm to feed herself) and got the dosage of her drugs wrong so she started hallucinating. Then after an outbreak of MRSA they discharged her early as they were concerned she was susceptible (which is all very well but inadequate follow up care).

Then my husband went into hospital for a hernia op, just as he was about to be anesthetised they started talking about removing his gall bladder - he told them that was the wrong op and they actually said it wasn't - so he argued with the doctors, got up and walked out in his surgical gown.

More recently, same trust, two female relatives had children in the same local hospital - both treated apallingly. One gave birth early. There was a sign up saying if you are going to bottle feed you must bring your own baby milk, but no understanding of babies being born prematurely and mum not being able to produce milk. The other had a c section, they wouldn't bring her breakfast so she had to go to the breakfast buffet with her drip and try to balance a tray on top of it.

Then this past Christmas my aunt fell over and hurt her ankle. Went to the local Urgent Care unit who xrayed it and said it was ok. Phoned her up 10 days later and said it was broken and was she walking on it.

My personal experience of the NHS has left me very wary of it and thinking it is rotten to the core, certainly in terms of my local NHS trust.



Me too, for all of the reasons stated above.

I think the concern is there are so many believable bad experiences it makes trusting the system even when it's good very hard.

Fwiw, I was told last summer I would be going into the eyeclininc every 8 to twelve weeks from now on to look at the new problem I have developed, and they would send me a letter in 'a few weeks'. Never heard back, never been back.

I should of course chase this, ultimately we must take responsibility for our own health, but I feel the system positively discourages this.


My experience of a privately run NHS hospital/treatment centre has been vastly better than pure NHS, and I think better than my experience of most private too. One of the major differences is that most of the doctors and nurses are not bristish, which I know puts a great number of people off. The care was tremendous. I took in a scared and cantankerous mother who was rude in her fear. After I ticked her off she apologised to the nurses who were so kind and dear to her I was amazed. They hugged her when she left and treated her with such kindness.

My best care last summer was from a young female Muslim doctor in a headscarf, again, something that puts many off. She phoned me several times afterwards to see how things were progressing (and said 'see you in eye clinic in a few weeks'.......).

Thrugelmir

vivatifosi wrote: »

They had gone public with their concerns over the system - due to concerns over patient safety - unfortunately though they had a gagging order on them.

You mean that they were happy to negotiate a sizable pay off to terminate their contract through their union or solicitor. All of a sudden they have a personal conscience.

Sums people up these days. Look after no 1 first.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

I've been to A&E twice in the last 15 years.

Once was overseas... In for a small but serious burn injury on my hand, on a bed being treated by a doctor within 5 mins, burns specialist called and attending within 15 minutes, treated and discharged within 90 minutes, with a weeks worth of medicine, dressings, etc, dispensed from the pharmacy on the way out. Truly excellent care, with appointment set for specialist a week later and his mobile number to call if anything worsened before then. All the staff that attended to me were Indian, and the hospital was in the Middle East. It was very well staffed, no waits at all, and everyone seemed to be seen/treated immediately on arrival.

Once was here in Scotland at an NHS hospital.... Attended for another superficial injury, waited 5 hours to be seen by a doctor, then another 3 hours to be seen by a specialist, and then 2 hours to be treated. At which point they admitted overnight, so I could get seen by someone else in the morning. Then they discharged, and called me back in 12 hours later as they'd forgotten to check something. All the staff were British/Irish, and seemed competent enough but horrendously overworked. Long waiting times, too many patients, not enough doctors/nurses.

If you'd looked at a snapshot of those two experiences, and had to guess which one was the third world country and which one was the UK, you'd never have expected the results to be as they were....

vivatifosi

Thrugelmir wrote: »

You mean that they were happy to negotiate a sizable pay off to terminate their contract through their union or solicitor. All of a sudden they have a personal conscience.

Sums people up these days. Look after no 1 first.

AIUI he is not the only one, however it is very hard to make things public if your concerns are subject to gagging orders. The government has said this should not be the case in concerns of public interest such as patient safety, but they would not intervene in court cases that are brought by the trust against whistleblowers as it is not their job. It was at this point I started shouting at the radio:o...

Say you were a radiographer or a nurse - someone on OK but not fantastic money. How could you take on a Hospital Trust that you've reported your concerns to but have gagged you, if you see no improvement? It's that type of issue I'm concerned about. I also have great concern with NHS Trusts using their money on these types of actions when they should be spending it on doing things right in the first place.

Cornucopia

Thrugelmir wrote: »

You mean that they were happy to negotiate a sizable pay off to terminate their contract through their union or solicitor. All of a sudden they have a personal conscience.

Sums people up these days. Look after no 1 first.

One of the first things that employers put into Compromise Agreements is a confidentiality clause. It can be negotiated upon to alter its effect, to an extent, but it really would have to be a gesture by the employer to specifically exclude whistleblowing.

BobQ

Thrugelmir wrote: »

You mean that they were happy to negotiate a sizable pay off to terminate their contract through their union or solicitor. All of a sudden they have a personal conscience.

Sums people up these days. Look after no 1 first.

This was a senior manager I believe.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9869579/NHS-whistleblower-faces-ruin-after-speaking-out-about-patient-safety.html

I only signed the order because my legal fees had reached £100,000 and I was about to lose my house

As ever principles often get traded when they affect your home or ability to pay a mortgage, education fees etc.

Ity seems that they make a habit of this at all levels although clearly not all arerelated to whistleblowing.

http://medicalharm.org/private-eye-special-investigation-shoot-the-messenger/all-those-pay-offs-in-full/

Generali

It seems that the desire to game league tables became endemic at about the same time in the Police too:

http://m.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/feb/26/police-failed-investigate-sex-attacks


Any Government that wants to control everything from the centre leaves themselves, and more importantly us, open to this sort of thing.

That poor woman now not only has to deal with having been raped but also with the inevitable thoughts that if only she'd tried harder to explain and convince then 2 children would be alive too despite her being completely blameless.

PaulF81

Time to put an age cap on treatments.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/feb/24/britain-ageing-population-lords-inquiry

The Nuffield Trust predicted a 32% increase in elderly people with moderate or severe disability, and a 32%-50% rise in over-65s with chronic diseases.

Professor Carol Jagger, of Newcastle University, forecast that unless treatment and cures were improved, the incidence of the five most common chronic conditions among the over-65s – arthritis, heart disease, stroke, diabetes and dementia – would increase by 25% by 2020 and more than 50% by 2030.

As a result of such stresses, the Nuffield Trust and the Institute for Fiscal Studies calculated that, even assuming "heroic" productivity improvements, the NHS would have a £28bn-£34bn shortfall – a significant proportion of its £110bn annual budget.

Anyone got a suggestion where we find another 34 billion quid? I am guessing the Labour Party don't have it down the back of the sofa. Youngsters won't continue to see their quality of life cut to pay for others who voted in governments who refused to save for a rainy day.

Things will get worse as long as the budget is pulled more towards one demographic.