Really upset about this

PALS, PALS, PALS...get this sorted. It is not right that you and your husband are being treated like this. Let them see how truly upset you are, politely, which is what you have done in this post. Hope all goes well for you.

There is a definite tendency to treat evryone over 65 as old and dement or senile or deaf even if most aren't. I'm 80 and went to the hospital to have my sprained ankle Xrayed. They shouted at me to move my leg into different positions and then shouted at me as I returned to the cubicle to put on my jeans. That stopped me in my tracks and I turned round and with my authoritive teacher's voice told them to stop shouting! That I was not deaf and that having a sprained ankle meant that I was slow and needed time to get dressed again.
They both looked at me absolutely surprised that anyone should dare to tell them off.

Exalted wombat yes doctors need their coping mechanisms but they shouldn't indulge themselves about individual patients within earshot of them and their relatives.
Unprofessional and distressing.

TBH I had a less helpful experience of PALS. I wanted to talk with them about how and why a fracture in my foot came to be overlooked with the result that I still need to use a stick outdoors after 3 years and I am always in pain. These outcomes are a direct result of the oversight.

I said to PALS that my OH and I had spent our lives working for the NHS and were aware that people are only human and can make mistakes, so I did not want to make a formal complaint; but they said they could do nothing unless I did. All I wanted was to try and make the point that the reason the problem arose was because several doctors ignored and dismissed what I was saying to them: e.g. "My foot is still very painful and I cannot walk on it" elicited the response "It is just uncomfortable where the plaster has been." When I said that this was not the case - I have had several fractures in my life and know what it feels like, it was dismissed. Several weeks later (still unable to walk) I initiated a private consultation at which the proper diagnosis was made - too late to do anything about it, other than surgery was admitted to be risky and with dubious outcomes.

I just wanted to get across the message: Listen to the patient. But I was not allowed to do that. Short of making a complaint about PALS I was a bit stuck!!

So, as has been suggested, email the CEO. I am sorry you are facing this extra challenge when your OH is so unwell.

Nanabilly - you took the words right out of my mouth. This post made me SO angry for the poor man lying in bed in pain or discomfort and doctors (doctors!!!!) laughing about not wanting to treat it because of its location.

I WOULD have marched up and totally lambasted them for it - and I am not one for confrontation, but oh my days, that really angered me

Serkeen - I hope your husband has now been discharged (minus boil) and that he is recovering at home with you.

But I would DEFINITELY make a restrospective complaint to PALS, as has been suggested already.

I can understand how tired and frustrated you feel and I agree with everyone that it would be good to have an advocate like PALS at your side. I complained once to a ward sister the way my mum was being treated. She was in her late seventies and had a broken pelvis. They insisted she use her elbows to push herself up on the bed. She did this many times while it caused great pain and resulted in the skin on her elbows coming off and them bleeding. I asked for her to have dressings or pads on them and two days later it was still not done. When I complained I was told my mum was an awkward patient, would not try to walk,move herself on bed (with bleeding elbows) etc... I told her I didn't believe her as mum had told me a different story, in fact the reason she broke her pelvis was she was in hospital and told she could manage to toilet on her own and they wouldn't help her, this resulted in her falling and lying on toilet floor until a patient rang for a nurse. Anyway the sister asked me if I was calling her a liar. I said well my mum hasn't like to me in fifty years so what do you think? There's bad apples in every professional, you need to get those doctors sorted out! Hope your husband gets home soon he's better off in your care.

No advice, just (((hugs)))

PALS are good for minor and major things. We had to make an appointment for my husband to have a check up because he had had bowel cancer. The hospital moved in the time between the letter being sent out and us ringing to book. We had the old number. We didn't know what to do so rang PALs, explained our predicament and they actually got the consultants secretary to phone us to make the appointment. She apologised profusely for the mistake wtih the number and gave us her number to phone if we needed to change the appointment.

Boils occur in long hospital stays (especially on the backside) through bad management. Does he have a vibrating mattress to help with circulation? If not, why not?

Another backup is to contact your GP. He has ultimate responsibility for you from cradle to grave, and I suspect would actually be listened to if he complained on your behalf. PALS is pot luck, some are really good, others, like our local one, absolutely useless. GP and hospital Chief Exec would be my route! Good luck I feel for you both, horrible situation when you can't see an end to it

I would make myself available at the next ward round and when they are all in the corridor away from your Husband, I would make it known what you heard and see what is said and give you the opportunity to clear the air. You most definitely deserve more respect than this and I dare say the comments may be have been made by junior doctors/medical students who whilst qualified have a long way to go in learning how to show respect. As both a former Nurse and a long term patient I have sadly seen a lot of this x

Sorry, pressed the post button by mistake.
You should have seen the expression on his face when I tapped him on the arm. I asked where the bottle was, and then told him I was reporting him for his attitude. He scurried away, and one of the nurses smiled at me and said 'Good for you, it's about time he was reported.' So I presume he was like that with other patients.
By the way, the reason my brother had collapsed was because he had cancer of the oesophagus which was discovered while he was in hospital. He had not been able to swallow food properly for weeks, but I didn't know.

Don't get upset from overhearing this sort of 'graveyard humour'. Doctors spend their days doing painful things to people, who sometimes die. They need their coping mechanisms too.

Complain, complain, complain. This is appalling and must be stopped. Write to the CEO of the Trust, your MP and your local councillor plus anyone else you might know in the NHS.

I would have challenged them straight away. When my brother, who was an alcoholic, collapsed at home one day I had to get an ambulance to take him to hospital. Everyone was so good to him, and one doctor especially came to talk to me, and explained that being alcoholic was an illness. Then when my brother woke up, he tried to get out of bed to go to the toilet, and a male nurse came to him, shouted at him to get back to bed, and went off supposedly to get a bottle . He didn't come back, so I went to look for him, to find him chatting to the nurses around the nursing station, just in time to hear him say 'I can't be bothered by people like him, '

I had occasion to contact PALS and they cut through all the red tape and got me the answers I was looking for.Seriously, give them a call.They are marvellous when you feel you have nowhere to go with poor care.

My mother was very poorly, terminally ill, a couple of years ago. After a serious lack of communication on the ward, I emailed PALs late on the Friday evening to be told by reply of email that someone from PALs would look at my comments in FOUR days. So I found the name of the CEO and emailed him on the Friday night, he replied to me by 08.00 on the Saturday and when I went to visit my mother at 12.00 midday, the most senior person on duty met me and the problem was resolved.

Email the Chief Executive now, cc the Consultant, explain what's happened and I imagine you'll get a reply soon. Please take someone calm with you to any meeting, keep notes and do a timeline before you go in - i.e. when did you husband go in, dates of ops and medications, who said what and when. This will take a little time, but will give you a good basis for discussion. Emails are good - they provide an audit trail, whereas phone calls can be mislaid.

I'm a nurse, my husband a doctor ... and all this guff about 'gallows humour' is unacceptable. If you could hear the doctors talking so, I suspect, could others, and it showed a lack of honesty, dignity and sensitivity.

Hope you get your answers, I'm sure you will. ?

I am wondering if your husband has a bed sore that has turned into a boil type thing. The reason I ask is he seems to have been in hospital for quite a while. These can be painful and become infected if not treated correctly.
I feel so sorry for you, I know from my own experience that when yourself or a loved one is ill or hospitalised you feel a total lack of power over your own destiny, you have mis-information on a daily basis and no matter how strong a person you are, this really wears you down. Unless you have been through it, you don't know. You will be feeling unhappy and frustrated re your husband's medical situation and his treatment. I agree with the others that you should report this, even if you feel really conflicted doing so , in that you're worried it will affect his continuing treatment. Contact PALS as others have said because you do need help with this, and even if at best, it was a 'Bit of fun' from their point of view, it was wholly unprofessional to do this where they could be overheard, and next time it could be when someone is grieving or very frightened so they do need a reprimand.
I hope you and your husband can stay strong, and best wishes to you both for a full and happy recovery.

Sometimes we need a "gallows" humour to cope with all the issues we are dealing with. I am not making excuses but you don't know what those doctors had been experiencing prior to their conversation. They are working with death and trauma every day. We do ask a lot of young doctors especially in these dreadful times of cut backs and bed shortages. This is why so many of our medics are making applications to work in other countries. They have paid for and are in debt over their six years of study and training so this generation realistically do not owe this country anything. We should cherish our doctors and give them a bit of leeway. They are human and what will we do without them?

Definitely with nanabilly on this one, in these situations you have to let them know you are aware. Find out when the Drs are doing there rounds next make sure you are there and ask the questions DONT wait to be told.

First, what an appallingly difficult time for you and your husband.
In your place I would follow the advice you have already been given and talk to the ward sister and the consultant involved. But, please, take a close friend or a relative with you, so you have a witness to what has been said.
No doctor or nurse should have made comments like that where they could have been heard by a patient or his relatives. It is a valid point that medical staff sometimes need to give rein to a bizarre sense of humour to get through their day, so do undertakers and priests, but professionals do so behind closed doors! You are justified in complaining about their attitude and demanding proper treatment for your husband.
"Bug" as we all know is a slang term. If what your husband is suffering from is a virus, it probably does not respond to antibiotics, which generally speaking only cure infections caused by germs, and in the case of a viral infection it makes sense to take your husband off the antibiotics which are doing no good, and may actually make him resistant to antibiotics, which will cause trouble, if he at some point needs them.
You are fully justified, too, in asking the consultant to tell you exactly what is wrong with your husband and don't hold back on asking questions if he explains things in a way you don't understand. Ask too, when you can expect your husband to be discharged from the hospital, as by no both you and he, poor man, are sick of the place!
I do hope your husband is soon well enough to come home for both your sakes.

"they are there"

I agree that medics' sense of humour can be an acquired taste - I am married to one! I am sure that the reluctance to lance the boil that you overheard is just a jokey exchange. A bit sick, but that is how they can be. Without some humour they would not cope with all they see and do.

But you do need to arrange to see the person in charge.

One of the biggest problems in hospitals (and indeed in health care in general) is communication. I often marvel that so many operations etc go smoothly - the right op on the right person! - but communication at that level seems to be good. It is the wider issues that get scrambled in the telling - I too have been on the receiving end of conflicting information from different staff members. And I worked in hospitals for years and getting the right information about the patient you will be seeing is sometimes a challenge.

It is entirely reasonable that you should ask to speak to the consultant. He/she is not god - they a their to help you and you OH and you need to go armed with the questions that really matter and to which you need answers.

I would make an appointment with the consultant your husband is under asap.Take a family member or friend with you.Make a list of your main grievances.Leave out small things. Ask when the boil will be dealt with. Boils of this nature often squirt
pus all over the place.Therefore maybe jokes Re who is doing it.However unacceptable in your hearing and no wonder you are upset.I am a retired Gp. Hope Dh better soon
Ps medics sense of humour can be in very poor taste.

I used to work in PALS they have to get things sorted within 24 hours or it turns into a formal complaint. However, I would have taken them to task then and there because it was breach of confidentiality a part from derilection of duty, if you heard that who else was able to?

I would e mail PALS and the consultant and CEO.....