Rape and sexual assault in hospitals.

Ilovecheese

People who are drunk or drugged can be removed from the wards, but dementia patients are staying on the wards.

That is definitely true. Many dementia patients are sexually disinhibited and/or have other very challenging behaviour,, and added to their physical illness and the confusion of being away from familiar surroundings they require 1-1 care, which is not always available, particularly on wards where there are a number of patients with similar issues.
Nursing home beds are in short supply, as are mental health specialist nurses on general and community wards, which leaves very challenging conditions on wards.

I suppose what is really needed is a determined effort to discover drugs to combat dementia and particularly violent dementia. It's not a very glamorous subject for research though.
I am not sure about more secure units as that might mask the problem and reduce the appetite for more research.

It’s a really difficult area. Fifty years ago complex dementia patients were grouped together on locked wards in psychiatric hospitals, and once admitted they never left - a dreadful existence for them and the staff who did their best to care for them. My experience as a trainee on those wards haunts me still. Now, they are looked after in the community whenever possible, or are admitted to a general hospital bed, or if they are really fortunate to a dementia assessment bed (as rare as hens teeth) but when their behaviour becomes challenging they are admitted to a care home, where often the experience is not much better than it would have been on those wards fifty years ago.
A miracle drug would be amazing, but in the meantime there are no easy answers.

Such an awful situation. On the one hand we would all want to keep dentin patients as safe, happy, dignified comformable as possible but on the other hand, they can be a risk to themselves and others

Medication would be a possible solution I suppose, maybe something calming but people tolerate medication so differently

Not sure the chemical cosh is the answer, maybe we should bring back the nursing assistant role which was so valuable in bedside nursing.

sodapop

Not sure the chemical cosh is the answer, maybe we should bring back the nursing assistant role which was so valuable in bedside nursing.

There are still healthcare assistants (not sure if that is their title) they do all the caring. The problem is they have many responsibilities. It can also be very difficult to handle patients with dementia, and some specialist training might be useful

Are there drugs that are more suitable than a chemical cosh on the horizon I wonder, if more and more people are going to suffer from dementia, more people are going to be at risk of sexual assault in hospital, and surely also nursing home settings.
Money spent now on research would be well spent to avoid future, more expensive, problems. No Government ever seems to look to the future in that way.

I don't know if their are figures for how many assaults are caused by dementia patients though, was that information gathered? Or should more hospital security be the focus?

Ilovecheese

Why on earth are trans people being brought into this by Violetsky ?

Because the fact the professor who wrote the report is a gender critical feminist was mentioned by the OP upthread. VS was then asked if she was suggesting that the report should be ignored because the author is gender critical.

So VS is responding to those posts. She did not originally bring trans issues into the thread. Hopefully it can stay on track regarding the awful events in hospitals now!

Well seeing as how violetsky has again dragged trans into the discussion, maybe this is worth looking at
She didn't (see my post above) and I can' t see the specific relevance of the examples you give, to this thread in this context