Latest Moan From You and Me 2025

Yes its all about statistics , waiting lists are coming down, but how many people are spending their life savings going private because of the long waiting lists, these kind of statistics don't get a mention.

They all talk about fixing the care for the elderly but never do, it's crazy that they dont see that as the biggest problem with the NHS.
They want everyone to live longer but dont want to look after them, or pay pensions for that matter. Who wants to live longer in a hospital bed, destitute, I think heads need banging together.
They cant even sort out the assisted dying bill, its taking forever and I dont think any of the MPs or "Lords" have the guts of a louse to get it sorted.

They were stating crime has gone down in recent years today, by the useless government figures, basically nobody bothers reporting it anymore because nobody does anything about it when you do.
Its the best way of getting the statistics sorted out, do nothing.

 

I just hang up on telemarketers because although annoying, they're at least trying to earn their money.

But scammers? No way. From now on I'm giving these crooks hell!

 

I only have a landline phone which is always switched to Ansaphone. If no message is left,the call isn't important or genuine as far as I am concerned.

 

If hotels can be made freely available for migrants, why not a similar system for hospital leavers? A nice single room, meals provided, medical care on site to oversee things. If the gov had the will to do it and was willing to use even a fraction of the money they funnel towards housing migrants, it could be made to work.

 

I can remember many years ago my grandmother going to a convalescent home after a hospital stay.
It was a large house in the countryside, looked very nice to me in those days, I dont think she liked it but at least she was not blocking a hospital bed.

 

Bed blocking isn't just caused by the elderly having nowhere to go. A couple of years ago my wife broke her leg badly on a Saturday evening (she hadn't been out on the razz). She was told that because the break was severe it had to be operated on either on Sunday, or Monday at the latest. Sunday came and went, as did Monday. She was told it would definitely be done on Tuesday which also came and went. Finally operated on Wednesday. We appreciate that emergencies can disrupt schedule, but for 3 days? She was told physio would be up to her on Thursday, which came and went as did Friday. Physio came on Saturday for about 5 minutes then said they would be back on Monday. Consultant also came later on Saturday to say she couldn't be released until she had a commode at home. This is a week after entering hospital - commode couldn't be ordered until Monday! No date for commode to be delivered. We finally convinced them to allow he home on the Tuesday as she would be upstairs anyway, and if she could get onto a commode she could get the 10 feet or so to the bathroom.
11 days in total, of which at least 4 could have been saved by some joined up thinking and departments actually talking to each other.

 

This is what a private hospital would not do, they work it out and work as one entity rather than different departments that haven't got a clue what the others are doing.

I see that private hospitals rarely work with emergencies but surely its not beyond the NHS to have some kind of separation between emergency departments and run of the mill type work.
Once you are IN, whatever happens in A&E should not affect your treatment or timescale.

 

Our bed blockers were resident for months and refused to budge until their #1 choice was available.

Still, 11 days is nasty for your wife to have to endure @KT53!

 

My Dad was one such 'bed-blocker' on a stroke ward. That was because there were simply no local care-home vacancies for weeks after he could be discharged. The complication for us was that he already had Alzheimers (made much worse by the stroke) and needed specialist care. After meeting with a local council hench-woman who tried to lay down the law, we felt under pressure to start looking further afield for places. I'm thankful we didn't bow to that pressure because once you're in a particular home it's difficult to transfer to a different one even if a more local vacancy arises. We did eventually find a local place. Considering he was self-funding it was a pretty terrible care-home and years after his passing I still beat myself up for not subsequently trying to make alternative arrangements for him.

 

In my opinion he was not a bed blocker. Nope. No way!

He had medical issues. I'm referring to those who don't need any medical supervision or attendant care.

A giant difference. And so sad.

 

@CanadianLori The delay in getting home was bad, but the food made it far worse. On a couple of occasions she sent me photo's and asked me to guess what it was supposed to be. I couldn't identify it! One pudding had a bright yellow half and bright pink upper half, with an expiry date of 2027 with my wife in hospital in 2023! She didn't eat it

 

The sad truth is people's health deteriorates in hospital, especially the elderly. My mum went in with a simple fracture, ended up staying 6 weeks, and came out a frail shell of her former self. Weight loss, dehydration, problems due to lack of movement, being forced to take any drugs you are on at the convenience of the ward schedule rather than how you are used to spreading them out through your day, disturbed sleep (eg through being woken at 2 am because suddenly there is an Xray slot available), etc, etc, are all the norm. The NHS appears to work for its own perpetuation with patients just being a pesky add-on.

 

@ViewAhead Deterioration in hospital isn't only an issue for the elderly. As mentioned previously my wife was in for 11 days and lost nearly a stone in weight. Admittedly she was overweight, but losing in excess of a pound a day seems crazy to me. For the first week she was only allowed out of bed to use the toilet, and didn't get any exercise at all for 11 days apart from the physio's spending as little time as possible showing her how to use the walking frame (which she never used after leaving hospital) and crutches, and how to go up and down stairs. 4 stairs to be precise. She's in her mid 60s but fully fit before the broken leg.

 

My mother was in hospital for a few weeks before she was let out to die.
They even lost her dentures, and then blamed us because she couldn't eat properly when she came out.
She seemed very frightened most of the time she was there and even said she was assaulted by a doctor in the middle of the night, she was not coherent at times so it was difficult to know if that was true or not.

Hospital is no place for people who are dying, in fact they even had special staff to impress upon her she was dying and god knows what they said to her when I wasn't there.