The British National Health Service (NHS) is said by its supporters in the world of left wing politics to be the envy of the world. However those of us who are forced to use the NHS often have the completely opposite view of the NHS compared to its cheerleaders. For us the NHS isn’t Britain’s ‘envy of the world’ but more like Britain’s shame.
According to a recent report in the Times written as part of its Times Health Commission series, there are approximately 11,000 preventable deaths in the NHS every year. Some of those deaths the Times claims are down to appallingly bad attitudes of staff, including doctors, conflict between doctors and nursing staff along with failures to safely hand over patient care from one staff shift to another.
The Times article also points out that the staff and management failures in the NHS may well have contributed to the very many and ongoing maternity care scandals and the NHS’s failure to treat those with Sepsis properly. I can confirm that these areas have problem as I saw appalling treatment at the maternity hospital where our son was born including a seemingly incompetent administration of an epidural. I’ve also experienced the NHS’s failure with Sepsis treatment from the case of my mother who was admitted to hospital with a cellulitis flare up and was put on completely the wrong antibiotic. The drug she was put on was one that the family knew did not agree with her and had been ineffectual in treating her cellulitis in the past. The family informed the doctors of this issue with the wrong antibiotic but the family was ignored, the wrong antibiotic was prescribed but by the time the doctors had realise their mistake and switched to the correct drug the Sepsis had set in too far to be countered and my mother died.
The Times said:
Patient safety is being put at risk by the “toxic” behaviour of doctors in the NHS, the health ombudsman has said.
Rob Behrens, who investigates complaints about the NHS in England, warned that the hierarchical and high-handed attitude of clinicians was undermining the quality of care in some hospitals.
He called for medical training to be redesigned to encourage a more empathetic and collaborative approach from doctors.
Pointing to failings in the treatment of sepsis and the problems in maternity services, Behrens said he was “shocked on a daily basis” by what he saw as ombudsman. Too often, “organisational reputation has been put above patient safety”, he told The Times Health Commission.
There are about 11,000 avoidable deaths every year in the NHS due to patient safety failings, with thousands more patients seriously harmed.
The ombudsman warned of a “Balkanisation” of health professionals, with rivalries between doctors and nurses or midwives and obstetricians harming patient care. “For all the brilliance of clinicians quite often they’re not very good at working together,” he said. “Time and again, the handover from one clinician to another, from one shift to another, or the inability to raise the issue at a senior level has been a key factor in what has gone wrong.”
Asked whether one of the problems was a “consultant is king” attitude in the NHS, he said there was “an element of that, absolutely”.
Behrens said there was a deep-seated lack of empathy in the medical profession. “Talking to some doctors, the way in which they were trained at medical school ten or fifteen years ago emphasised the importance of being self-contained and confident in their judgment about what happens and I think that’s an element which is still there,” Behrens said. “What should be a collegiate, trusting environment is nothing of the kind.”
The article then went on to describe seemingly endemic sexual harassment within the NHS with The Times claiming that one third of female surgeons complaining of sexual harassment. It’s quite clear to me that the NHS is in a mess with its staff. Whilst NHS management is obscenely incompetent and wasteful and too many staff are uncaring arseholes, it should not be forgotten that those decent members of staff in the NHS suffer from the cultures of bad management, incompetent virtually unsackable colleagues and have to work with other staff who seem to believe that they have a licence to behave in a predatory manner to fellow medics.
The NHS is no longer fit for the purpose of providing a comprehensive healthcare system for British subjects. Many of us no longer trust it to care for us or our loved ones. The NHS needs to die and be replaced with something better, less wasteful and also less lethal to its customers.
PS I have been somewhat absent from writing recently as I’ve just got other a massive gum infection that laid me out for a few days. Sorry about that.
Too many don’t give a damn about the most basic things. I have visited my local hospital – (Northampton General Hospital) – hundreds of times over the years visiting a procession of older family members and friends, and I have never, ever seen doctors or nurses bother to use the hand disinfectant dispensers situated outside every ward. The only staff member whom I have seen obey the rules was a West Indian lady bringing meals round the ward, who scrupulously used hand-cleaners between every bed. My mother died of a hospital-acquired infection, and when I went back to the ward that she had been on with some paperwork, it was empty of patients and being cleaned. This seemed like a positive step until the woman at the nurses’ station offered her fatuous opinion that “Disinfecting wards is a waste of time because you can pick up more infections in Tesco’s.” (Obviously people in hospital aren’t in Tesco’s – and people in Tesco’s haven’t got open wounds and reduced resistance to infection…!) As I left, two doctors came swaggering into the ward, white coats flapping . Obviously, they were far too important to bother with disinfectant – and promptly brought whatever germs they’d picked up that day, back into the freshly disinfected ward.
I agree too many NHS staff seem to be far too blase about cleanliness.
Sorry to hear about your gum infection, wishing you a speedy recovery.
Take care & be well.
Thank you so much for the good wishes. I’ve had gum infections before but this one wiped me out. Cauterised the infection with some scotch and then rested to let nature take its course. Couldn’t be arsed with having to deal with the NHS to get antibios. I wish there were simple medicine shops for those customers like myself who know that what they need, at least in this case, is a seven day course of Amoxicillin.
“…..As I left, two doctors came swaggering into the ward, white coats flapping . Obviously, they were far too important to bother with disinfectant – and promptly brought whatever germs they’d picked up that day, back into the freshly disinfected ward.”……Phil Copson.
It sounds as if another Dr Ignaz Semmelweis needs to be born.
General hygiene standards in the NHS have been appalling for years. They put my uncle into a side room with shit stained and soiled bedding piled up. I agree there is a need Semmelwies to deal with the filthy state the NHS has got itself into.
That was a blast from the past about Dr Ignaz Semmelweis.
I read about him 50 years ago in a book called.
The Cry and the Covenant is a novel by Morton Thompson.
A brilliant book. Well recommended.