Are they really interested?

[john51]

A few weeks ago I went to my local hospital for a bowel screen. My wife came with me for support.
When the first member of staff came to speak to us, my wife explained to her that I have early onset dementia, and am severely sight impaired. The response was that the nurse demanded 'who says he has dementia'. I was already a bit agitated but this really set off full blown confusion, and worse was to come.
I still remember much of what happened weeks later. I wrote a long email to the hospital, and they have asked us to go to a board meeting to explain the problems, which sounds great. My question though is are they really interested or are they ticking a box, which look good when the CQC next visit?

 

[LadyA]

Tbh, @john51 , I would grab the chance to try and educate someone anyway!! And well done you for writing the email, and standing up not only for yourself, but for others too!

 

[john51]

Tbh, @john51 , I would grab the chance to try and educate someone anyway!! And well done you for writing the email, and standing up not only for yourself, but for others too!

Thanks LadyA. We fully intend to go. Our contact at the hospital is quite positive about our input. I keep re-reading my email. My wife assures me that what I wrote at the time was accurate.

 

[Kevinl]

I think you'll find that the management are rightly very concerned and I hope something gets done about it, but, if your hospital is anything like my local one then they have hundreds of staff from consultants to cleaners and everything in between and to give them all even a minimum amount of insight into what dementia actually means and for it all to filter through is a huge exercise.
Our local hospital has a "yellow butterfly" scheme and people with memory issues are offered a stick on badge of a yellow butterfly, great scheme but I had to explain it to one of their consultants who said he'd never heard of it. OK so he wasn't part of the memory team, it was a totally different issue we were there about but I'd still expect them to know what the badge meant.
K

 

[john51]

I think you'll find that the management are rightly very concerned and I hope something gets done about it, but, if your hospital is anything like my local one then they have hundreds of staff from consultants to cleaners and everything in between and to give them all even a minimum amount of insight into what dementia actually means and for it all to filter through is a huge exercise.
Our local hospital has a "yellow butterfly" scheme and people with memory issues are offered a stick on badge of a yellow butterfly, great scheme but I had to explain it to one of their consultants who said he'd never heard of it. OK so he wasn't part of the memory team, it was a totally different issue we were there about but I'd still expect them to know what the badge meant.
K

My local hospital has the 'yellow butterfuly scheme' too. When it works it great. Unfortunately during a recent stay on the stroke unit, a senior junior doctor said you cant have dementia you are too young for it. You need to calm down and stop getting hysterical.

 

[john51]

I know Kevini is right about how big a job it is. I'm sure that at the top they are doing their best. So are many brilliant people from the top down. When I used to teach I often told work groups that any team is only as strong as the weakest member. The problem for any hospital is that this is still true.
Its really good that my hospital is trying in this way

 

[LadyA]

Unfortunately during a recent stay on the stroke unit, a senior junior doctor said you cant have dementia you are too young for it. You need to calm down and stop getting hysterical.

I got a bit hysterical myself, when I read that, John!

 

[john51]

We went to the meeting today. It was very clear that management are interested and want to create the correct culture. They have carried out some changes to practice and want to stay in touch to talk about others.
We felt very positive

 

[Cat27]

That’s good @john51. I’m pleased it was a positive experience for you.