Cataract treatment - can it really be true?

moneyistooshorttomention · 8 February 2018 at 12:14AM

A friend of mine that also moved to Wales recently has been told (via an optician locally - not word of mouth from someone-in-the-street) that she will be made to wait one YEAR between the first eye being done and the second one being done.

The optician said the reason is the powers-that-be in the Welsh NHS are refusing to take on people for those jobs if they don't speak Welsh and the posts are being left vacant!!!!!!!!!

I've heard of someone other than the best person for the job being taken on. I've heard of the best person for the job being taken on and made to agree they will learn Welsh (in, say, 2 years).

I've not heard the situation is as best as refusing to take on anyone suitable for these jobs if they can't find a Welsh speaker and then imposing a year wait on patients because of the resultant lack of staff (instead of the normal 3? months wait between eyes).

Is that really true? - though I know it is an optician that said it ....so one must assume it is the truth.

Has anyone any evidence of these posts being left unfilled for this "reason"?

Has anyone been made to wait for more than 3 months to get their second eye done?

elsien · 8 February 2018 at 12:21AM

I'm not sure a high street optician would be any more in the know about NHS recruiting policies than your average person in the street.

teddysmum · 8 February 2018 at 12:48AM

elsien wrote: »

I'm not sure a high street optician would be any more in the know about NHS recruiting policies than your average person in the street.

The Specsavers holder of our nearest franchise works at the local hospital's eye department as well as at her premises.

Cuts are being made to surgery such as cataract and joint replacement. My husband was speaking to someone caught in this web only last week.

The lady is not elderly but needs a hip replacement and happens to ride her horses. She was at the hospital ,last week ,and her specialist said things were difficult.

He asked her for her opinion on whom he should treat, giving her the option of herself, relatively young and having a hobby which didn't help and a 60 year-old lady ,who would be enabled to enjoy walking her dog.

I know from watching a tv series that there are surgeons who have to make ,not just life improving, but life or death decisions because of shortages.

A look at wastage, over payment for services and charging those not entitled to 'free' NHS would go a long way to help the situation.

moneyistooshorttomention · 8 February 2018 at 8:25AM

Update on this - my friend says it should be 4-6 weeks between eye 1 and eye 2 (ie that's the amount of time in between operations - from the point of view of the patient having time for first eye to be completely sorted before doing second eye).

We are in Wales.

Friend says she was told it would be a year in between eye 1 and eye 2 originally by a nurse and was gobsmacked at the Welsh NHS saying it will be about 11 months unnecessary extra wait in between the two. Hence she then asked an optician and was told the same by him.

What she has been told isn't "This is because it's the NHS".

What she has been told is "This is because it's the Welsh NHS - and they are refusing to take on people to do the job because they can't find anyone suitable that can speak Welsh language (ie as well as actually being able to do the job)".

The problem - she's been told - is the language "requirement" (not the NHS per se iyswim).

She's been told there are people they could take on for these jobs - but the Welsh NHS is refusing because they don't speak Welsh, as well as having the "necessary qualifications and experience they actually need".

My friend is someone that didn't believe things were any different here to the rest of the country/was learning Welsh herself at one time for a while (out of interest - rather than being forced to for any reason, as we're retired and so can't be forced to) and is gasping with astonishment about it.

unforeseen · 8 February 2018 at 10:45AM

In Wales it's very much a case of where you are that decides whether Welsh speaking is required

My HB don't seem to worry about it for the acute hospital in the East of the area as it borders England so Welsh isn't very prominent. However in the West, Welsh is the predominant language especially for the older generation (where it may be their only language) so the majority of staff in that hospital need to be Welsh speakers

pmduk · 8 February 2018 at 10:49AM

This is how the Welsh pay for their 'free prescriptions'

BorisThomson · 8 February 2018 at 11:00AM

It's an old report but this story seems a more accurate representation of what is going on.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/health/concern-cataract-patients-turned-down-1884340

It's down to cuts. Surely everyone knows how bad things are in the NHS across the nation?

I've looked at several job descriptions and the criteria to speak Welsh is desirable, not essential.

Red-Squirrel_2 · 8 February 2018 at 12:25PM

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Is that really true? - though I know it is an optician that said it ....so one must assume it is the truth.

It certainly confirms/reinforced a lot of your prejudices if it is true, doesn't it?

Maybe, like the rest of the NHS, there are posts that are unfilled and its nothing to do with the Welsh language?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jan/23/nhs-england-recruitment-crisis-nursing-vacancies

https://www.bma.org.uk/news/2017/september/one-in-12-consultant-posts-unfilled

https://www.bma.org.uk/news/2016/december/one-third-of-gp-vacancies-remain-unfilled

moneyistooshorttomention · 8 February 2018 at 3:52PM

I can only go by what an optician said - and assume he knows what he's talking about in the situation.

I do know "that phrase" crops up often in job adverts here (ie the "desirable but not essential" one). Though I have seen adverts. specifying it's "essential".

What an advert says and what actually happens might be two different things. I know someone who works for one of the County Councils here told me they witnessed staff in an office deciding between job applicants just looking for the answer to "that question" first (ie the one about whether they speak Welsh) and just literally throwing all the applications in the bin where they'd given the "wrong answer" to the question without even looking to see what qualifications/experience they had. They were telling me this eye witness episode because they were so shocked that a lot of good candidates (maybe including the correct person for the job - ie the best candidate) weren't even getting a look-in because of prejudice against them for not speaking Welsh.

Now I can think "maybe" about a tale I was told this morning by someone about a science teacher getting sacked from a job he already had because of not speaking Welsh - even though there wasnt anyone to replace him and the school landed up without a science teacher because they did that. Person concerned said they'd heard this 3rd-hand and so couldnt vouch for it having happened.

But when you hear from the horses mouth (the person that told me what my local County Council did - as they witnessed it with their own eyes) or from an "expert" (like an optician) that something has happened = then you believe them they've witnessed the evidence of this sort of thing happening.

wondercollie · 8 February 2018 at 4:55PM

I worked in a cataract unit foe eight years in the Canadian health system and have heard similar rumours here.

It totally depends on where you live. In my province, if the second eye requires surgery it can be anywhere from two weeks to six months wait depenion the surgeons list. In the province where my Mum lives, it one eye per year. If you want the second eye done sooner, you pay to have it done privately.

Resources are limited every where. I!!!8217;ve wondered over the years why some people were even having surgery. I remember one who came from a palliative care unit for bilateral cataract surgery. Palliative care, here, is for people with a 90 day life expectancy. It made no sense to my one that day. We heard through the nurses grapevine that the patient died ten days later.

99 yo with dementia and bed bound? The rationale was they could enjoy watching television with improved vision.

moneyistooshorttomention · 8 February 2018 at 5:15PM

I get the point re a 99 year old on palliative care and, to me, my very first thought there would be "Why put them through that - when they've got so little life left. They might as well enjoy their remaining time as best they can".

Bit of a different scenario when the person concerned is early 60s and lives in a village whereby they need to be able to drive their car (as the bus service is SO bad to it) and they also need to be able to drive long distance journeys at intervals back to their family in Southern England. My friend is responsible enough she has temporarily given up driving whilst she waits for this to be sorted - to which I think "Well the NHS is going to get lucky she wouldnt be someone that would go out there driving again as soon as the second eye should have been done" and will let them restrict her life until it's actually done. Many would start driving again as soon as they "should" be able to....

Me - I've told her I see her as having two choices:
- fight them HARD and, with the "reason" she's been given, I'd make it "personal"...:cool:
or
- pay their bill to have the second eye done privately after the correct amount of waiting (ie just a few weeks).

If this really is a "language" thing (as the optician said) - she's been told I'll be there cheering her on obviously. She's told me that she didn't believe all the stories I've been relaying back to her (as people told me about incidents)/didn't think people would really act that way basically - until now....

Cataract treatment - can it really be true?

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