The NHS Appreciation Thread

[mancityvstoke]

Saw the thing that kinda blew up on Twitter today re healthcare in Guernsey, no NHS there and you pay for A&E visits etc.
Was news to me. V glad we aren't the same

Out of interest ..... what happens to those people who have no extra money to pay?

Serious question .

Do they treat them or turn them away? How does that stop abusing the system if they treat you even if you’re broke? Or does it just stop those who can pay?

 

[SilverFox2]

That is a huge problem. I attended a new technology event at SRFT and there are great ideas in the pipeline. A lot use your mobile phone but the problem is data protection. Ideally as we become more tech aware and savvy, your own phone will become your own personal medical record holder. Strides are being made in diabetes where you use your phone to contact a central database with your daily results. Diabetes aint my area, I don't know what it is or involves but the technology will be available. In my area teledermatology will make a difference to appointments as you can see a Doctor over the internet. I am not tech savvy at all but the powers that be hold great hope for this developement

Surely a mobile app for making doctor or nurse appointments is not difficult to design and does not require the degree of computer sophistication eventually needed at treatment stage.

 

[FantasyIreland]

So the abuse you talk about is personal aimed at you for being on the front line. If so that is a societal problem and a result of years of austerity, cuts in police numbers and the rise of ensuing violence and loss of common decency. I obviously totally condemn any abuse or violence aimed at any person who works in the NHS.

That was not what I asked you though, I asked how the NHS was being abused, not how you personally had been abused but I see the correlation and understand the frustration

Looks like I need to spell it out....I wasn't talking about personal abuse,although that is a huge problem,I was talking about health tourists or people using the Ambulance service as a glorified taxi ride or a baby sitting option or as a mobile chemist etc.

Ignorance/selfishness/lack of education- it all amounts to abuse.

 

[crazyadi]

Bed blocking is a sad result of the spike in population over a certain age and the lack of places to send people who are not able to return home but should not be in hospital. More investment is needed in the care sector.

I have not heard of one instance of a patient dying on a trolley in A&E because of lack of beds, I am sure it has happened though and that is a result of an overstretched A&E being not able to cope with a large influx of patients at one time.

The kid with a temperature might not have been able to get a GP appointment, there is a chronic lack of GP provision and most surgeries are massively oversubscribed. Giving GPs the extra burden of managing the finances of their surgeries means less appointments available.

People are rightly selfish when it comes to their health, you only get one go at life and the service should enact change so that the inherent selfishness of every persons needs is met.

Wow just wow. I am even more concerned that you are an inspector after reading that drivel. It is because of people like you that front line staff like me are under the pressure we are. Let's look at your points.

Bed blocking can indeed be as a result of not enough available beds in the community, it's also a result of families not wanting uncle fester discharging until they have finished there holiday in the Costa del sol, it's also the result of families refusing a bed in a perfectly adequate care facility. Don't excuse it.

Correct it has happened that people have died on trollies waiting whilst waiting to be moved to a ward. It happened to my partners grandmother so I have personal and professional experience of it. The fact you arnt aware it happens is frankly quiet concerning. And the fact your response to it potentially happening is "it's due to an overstretched A&E" shows your complete lack of understanding.

The kid might not have been able to get an appointment at the Drs, perhaps his parents could have given him some paracetamol, spoke to the pharmacy, called the NHS helpline, what he didn't need, whilst Albert was having a cardiac arrest, was a God dam ambulance.

I have no words for your last point where you defend everyone's right to abuse the system as they see fit. The idea that the service should meet everyone's unrealistic expectations is frankly unrealistic and is exactly what I would expect from a behind the scenes NHS pen pusher.

 

[crazyadi]

Tell me what the abuse is then. Then I can use this at meetings to enact change. If you see abuse its your duty to report it, if you say nothing how can anything possibly ever get better?

No one cares, that's why wards have 2 people medical teams. 2 nurses looking after 30 bed wards, a third of those patients high risk and needing 1to1 monitoring but only 4 support workers. Hilary whining her mum hasn't had her cup of tea yet, but that's because the staff doing the tea are currently being smacked about by Morris, 1 of the 10 1to1 patients, security can't help because they are at an incident in A&E. And on and on and on.

 

[crazyadi]

That is a huge problem. I attended a new technology event at SRFT and there are great ideas in the pipeline. A lot use your mobile phone but the problem is data protection. Ideally as we become more tech aware and savvy, your own phone will become your own personal medical record holder. Strides are being made in diabetes where you use your phone to contact a central database with your daily results. Diabetes aint my area, I don't know what it is or involves but the technology will be available. In my area teledermatology will make a difference to appointments as you can see a Doctor over the internet. I am not tech savvy at all but the powers that be hold great hope for this developement

Using SRFT as beacon for IT progreas is apparently a joke. A friend of mine who is a Dr there has told me they have just updated some computers on wards to windows 10, the rest are still on windows 7 I believe, and half the applications don't work now including such critical things as safe staffing software.

 

[Southern]

What are these medical certificates you talk about? By deliberately getting things on prescription you can buy over the counter, can you explain what you mean by that? People do arrive late for appointments in all walks of life, a creaking infrastructure and poor parking facilities does not help. People who need the NHS are usually ill, is it no surprise they might be to ill to attend an appointment. Making complaints because you can?? If you have something to complain about by all means complain, the service is not perfect and complaints help form opinion in how change can be affected. If nobody complained nothing would ever change

Power is basically with patients.
Clinicians practice very defensively not only so they don’t miss anything but also for the ‘customer is always right’ culture

I agree a lot can be learned from complaints, but I know some people just booking appointments to get free meds lik multivitamins in pregnancy, paracetamol for young kids with a cold - they could easily get these cheap at Poundland or the supermarket. They even lie to receptionists (fair enough if they genuinely need the appointment but some don’t) when booking appointments

I know someone who complained recently because she had bloods taken and it left a bruise and ‘disinfectant was not used to clean the skin’ (makes no difference in reducing infection and can affect the blood result )- no matter that she is having the bloods done for no extra cost and it is done at a place of convenience for her.

 

[denislawsbackheel]

Surely a mobile app for making doctor or nurse appointments is not difficult to design and does not require the degree of computer sophistication eventually needed at treatment stage.

It exists
https://www.patientaccess.com/
My GP was part of it then dropped out.
It's fucking useless

 

[denislawsbackheel]

Power is basically with patients.
Clinicians practice very defensively not only so they don’t miss anything but also for the ‘customer is always right’ culture

I agree a lot can be learned from complaints, but I know some people just booking appointments to get free meds lik multivitamins in pregnancy, paracetamol for young kids with a cold - they could easily get these cheap at Poundland or the supermarket. They even lie to receptionists (fair enough if they genuinely need the appointment but some don’t) when booking appointments

I know someone who complained recently because she had bloods taken and it left a bruise and ‘disinfectant was not used to clean the skin’ (makes no difference in reducing infection and can affect the blood result )- no matter that she is having the bloods done for no extra cost and it is done at a place of convenience for her.

Good on patients who lie to GP receptionists.
I object strongly to being triaged by an unqualified desk jockey when I want see my GP.

 

[kaz7]

And how many years ago was that? I assure you that things have changed beyond recognition in the NHS over the last decade, its unrecognisable from when I first hit the wards, the last 5/6 years has seen that escalate. Bed blocking IS someones fault, usually the family who don't want such and such home, or don't want to pay x amount. People die on trolleys in A&E because of peoples selfishness, people die waiting for an ambulance that's currently with a teenager with a frigging temperature. You cant get into your Drs because someone has an appointment with a bloody cold. People are selfish and don't deserve the NHS. They are me me me!

Overeaction much.you sound really unhappy in your job,i'm a patient now who has been seen in hospital a few times for broken bones,the service was very quick,even in A&E,maybe my health trust is excellently run