Too posh to wash?

Do you think problems began when services broken up and given to cheapest bidder e.g cleaning / catering etc?

I agree with you ajenela.I completed my SEN training in 1969.

I was part of the May 1964 set at St Georges Hospital London so next year we will be celebrating our 50th Anniversary. It was us students that did the work on the wards but we were learning skills and how to run a ward. And when we were qualified we able to run a ward. But running a ward was much easier then, My time in the NHS has been a constantly learning process as Medicine has become more complicated and Nurses take on more specialised roles. The nurse of today is in a completely different world than the one I joined 50 years ago.

But I do feel the ability to run a ward has been taken away from nurses. If a cleaner isn't doing her job properly the nurse has go to the cleaner's manager and not able to deal with it herself. Student nurses are on wards to learn but not take responsibility. Also 50 years ago the ward was run from a book in the centre of the ward which told you what needed doing and the writing was filling in the cardex at the end of the shift. Now hours are spent writing as everything has to be written down in numerous places in case of litigation. If the paper work could be reduced they might have more time to NURSE.

Oh dear. Poor little girl.
Welcome confusedbeetle - good post. Trouble is the targets were for the wrong things weren't they - or that they did not included care-related targets. I'm told by a relative that "cutting the number of beds" is the bid priority these days

Thanks for update vega

Poor girl! Thank goodness her father was able to get things moving - I do hope she'll be fit and well soon. Thanks for the update, vegasmags.

Just a quick update about my neighbour's daughter for those of you kind enough to ask. She has just been taken down to theatre, query appendicitis, also an ovarian cyst - only 13 bless her - so at least some resolution in sight.

I was an SEN and we had a good basic training.

I am new to this thread and tried to read every post but I became so saddened by the personal comments that I had to skim over a great deal so excuse me if I have missed salient points. My career of 35 years has largely been in nursing, midwifery health visiting and management. I could right an essay on the changes good and bad but it would be too long. The most damaging times for nurses and patients have been the many organisational changes imposed. Nursing has changed and mostly not for the better. This is not caused by education. When I started nursing in 1969 it was considered a career suitabe for educated women and men. We undertook all the most basic nursing care, and a great deal of the cleaning. Standards were pretty good but we were paid so little it was easy to have five of us on duty on one ward. That cannot happen now. There is a concern about the quality of SOME candidates as I saw when a guest interviewer for a high prestige university. Some of this was attitude but most was poor educational standards Many good candidates had already worked as HCAs and carers. My family have experienced some poor hospital experiences. Some individuals were marvellous, many not. The introduction of targets has in my opinion damaged quality of care and put enormous pressure on staff. This develops in to a system of culture change seen in many hospitals. Making nurses work as HCAs before training is ill thought out and impractical. It is a knee jerk response to a very complex poroblem- This cannot be diminished to blaming individuals and adding another layer

Absolutely jane. I started another thread about the 111 'service' (contradition in terms?) calling every 6 hours but with still no doctor after 18 hours.
Subsequently, 24 hours later, she took matters into her own hands, called an ambulance (they have no transport) and he was 'blue-lighted' into hospital.
The paramedic on the ambulance remarked that he was so dehydrated, he was surprised he hadn't fitted! Nothing to do with nursing of course, but he was discharged 2 days later still suffering from D&V and unable to keep his Dyoralite (sp?) down.

I'm sure you're right jane and it's really quite scary to think what might have happened if dad hadn't been so assertive.

Vegasmags If the registrar thought it necessary to give IV fluids it sounds as though your neighbour's daughter was severely dehydrated, and if she had been 'left to get on with it' for much longer the outcome would have been much worse.

Thank you Reddevil I will indeed.

How awful for them vega- it's bad enough for your child to have to be admitted to hospital but to see them in pain and untreated is horrendous. You trust the 'experts' to do the best for your child but the poor father had to take matters into his own hands.
What's even worse is the private sector. A lot of them still have no 24 hour resident medical officer.
Do let us know the outcome please?

Although I said in an earlier post that I wouldn't like to see nurses scapegoated for all the ills endemic in the NHS, I find what has happened to my very dear neighbours in the last couple of days hard to understand. Their daughter was admitted to hospital late on Monday evening with severe abdominal pains and vomiting. They are a very level headed couple but were so concerned about her that they called an ambulance. Various tests have been carried out but no diagnosis has yet been made. So far, so good. I spoke to dad yesterday evening who said his daughter had spent the day vomiting and writhing on the bed in agony. Eventually he confronted the ward nurses and said that surely something could be done for his daughter in terms of pain relief. Rather reluctantly, they eventually called the registrar who immediately ordered IV fluids and morphine which had the desired effect. My neighbour was very upset by what he perceived as the uncaring attitude of the nurses. He was also left feeling that if he hadn't made a big fuss, his daughter would simply have been left to get on with it. Of course, I don't know all the ins and outs, but it is hard to understand why nurses would ignore a child in pain.

Been there Anno. And he usually had a big dog and was wearing a singlet.

In my canvassing days, it wasn't unusual for me to meet a person who said he (usually a man) wasn't interested in politics, never voted and then proceeded to give me his opinion on everything from dog poo to immigration!

Well said, lily, and spot on.

No such thing as an apolitical person! May not have much time for party politics, MPs, Parliament, local council but everything else is politics. I wish more people were aware of this and then they might begin to take a more active part in Politics.

It's the afternoon here actually. And just for the record (even if he has departed) DIL put in many years in the NHS. Very not impressed with the Australian private hospitals in which she has been working recently - cutting their staffing to the bone and beyond.
Mystified as to why anyone can be interested in something that is perceived to be amiss with the NHS or in a change that will affect the NHS but not able to see that politics plays a part every time a government changes anything in it. Most university lecturers I know are painfully aware of the impact that politics has had on higher education. .

Sorry, not precise enough. I should have said you care, or appear to care, about the NHS. Since politics affects the NHS, you are not apolitical.

But you care about political affairs, such as those which run, or interfere with the running of, the NHS. So you are not apolitical.

PS. I am indifferent to the politics of the NHS and definitely not involved in politics. Stop making it so hard to leave the site.

Cheerio

Ah, that would explain her post at 08.27 am. It's actually late evening there. Thanks for the heads up Bags Presumably her DiL is also in the antipodes and nurses there.
I know I joined this site for the chance to chat, but it's interfering with my day to day routine, such as it is. So, reluctantly, I'll bid all you ladies sorry woman, adieu.