Click below for the Daily Mail feature - and have your say HERE - on your own forum! Steve.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2056828/Jails-care-criminals-better-hospitals-care-elderly.html

As an ex nurse myself roughly around the same time as the person writing the article above I feel totally in tune with her feelings and it makes me very emotional indeed to read her story and recall my experiences of the NHS.I read a comment below the article stating that comparisons with prisons was inappropriate. One of the most common questions asked of me by patients locked in this particular institution was "Why am I locked in, I have never done anything wrong in my life". The patients certainly feel as though they are imprisoned in these EMI HOMES!. General Nursing is so easy and straight forward compared to nursing patients in need of psychiatric care....the level of skill required (if learned and applied) is far superior...having said that I believe that every Psychiatric trained nurse in charge of Dementia patients should also be trained in General Nursing...and they should be of the very highest quality because a psychiatric patient is not always able to reliably communicate their needs or feeling or describe their pain etc...this particularly so in patients in the end stage of Dementia. Therefore great skill in observation techniques is required and acted on in a timely manner for the benefit of the patient. As we all know Dementia causes a break down of ALL organs the brain controls because of the damage to the brain itself...At the moment the staff with the LEAST experience take care of HEALTH NEEDS and note them in the care home notes on which MDT panels make judgement!! OUTRAGEOUS....Even where there are Registered Nurses present they know very little about dementia and the needs of the patient...they do not consider dementia patients worthy of their time and leave all the care to the least trained in their charge...I know this from my experience in general nursing and in my experience working in a psychiatric hospital and hours spent visiting an EMI home. These conditions have GOT to change...the fact that our relations are having to pay twice for this standard of care is criminal, adding insult to injury. Thank you Steve for the link and encouraging comment

And thank YOU 'Mergy' for your most valuable contribution! There are many forum members who are retired or practising nurses and their views are essential because they are PROFESSIONAL carers. I often question the fact that 'Nurse Assessors' and those appearing at review panels may well be RGN's - but what experience and qualifications do they have in specialist dementia care? I suggest that anyone presented with an 'assessment' of a dimentia patient demand to be advised of the 'assessor's' qualifications and experience in this discipline - prior to consenting to the assessment!
Steve

As someone who is frequently in and out of hospital,I would just like to say that there are a lot of good doctors and nurses within the NHS,However there are also a lot of deadwood masquerading as nurses as well.Sadly the politicians cannot escape blame ,because instead of leaving well alone ,BLAIR ,BROWN and the rest of the clique ,conspired to interfere with a system ( which had it,s faults) but at least it worked,by smashing it up to create the present day PCT'S which we all know is and has been a total disaster.My last stay in hospital was just over two weeks ago,there was more people walking the wards carrying clipboards,trying to look intelligent,than there was nurses,One night in particular, there was one staff nurse and two auxilaries to look after 50 patients,as you can imagine,buzzers were going all night and they could not cope, yes NEW LABOUR did it's work well,and created an expensive monster that is definately not fit for purpose,Bring back the matron, and have one manager in charge of each facility,but make he or she ACCOUNTABLE and if they do not cut the mustard, prosecute them!

kind regards to all
all4justice

[quote="Esquires"]I suggest that anyone presented with an 'assessment' of a dimentia patient demand to be advised of the 'assessor's' qualifications and experience in this discipline - prior to consenting to the assessment!


I asked this question of the panel members at the MDT meeting I attended this year...all RGN's and one in training! I have checked out every person in the LHB who adjudicate on various panels if ANY of them are trained psychiatric nurses... none are....when I questioned the authority of RGN's making ill informed (in more ways than one) judgement on the Health needs of patients suffering dementia I was told "advice if needed would be sought" Amazing arrogance isn't it...?

What could one possibly say without being hugely insulting....if I had spoken my mind I would be banned from all future meetings of any denomination.

At my first and only MDT meeting so far I was accused by the co-ordinator of being obstructive.....at the very end of the meeting when everybody had left she said "I shouldn't have called you obstructive" No comment by me in reply.

I did write in much more graphic detail the shortcomings and inaccuracies in the DST and the said persons nursing assessment of my mother prior to DST...because of her remark to me in my successful appeal to the Board...thus allowing her occasion to get to know me a little better!!

Steve if one refused to attend a meeting without the a psychiatric nurse being present the system would collapse.....what a good idea!

I will add that ALL knowledge I had at the time of MDT meeting in regard to all matters outside nursing experiences was gained on this site...I quoted the 1946 National Health Service Act...and their comment in the MDT about me was "She has substantial knowledge of the law and feels that her mother has a right in Law to CHC" I can hear the indignation in the co-ordinators voice now!!
MG[b]