so many of the other patients I’ve seen come and go could do with someone like you to ensure they get what they need.
I must admit that I was genuinely disappointed that there aren't more volunteers or even folk a step down from Healthcare Assistants whose role is simply to be with folk in need.
Of course the last thing wards need -- a somewhat sceptical casual observer writes! -- is more compartmentalised roles, but if the nurses are there 'just' for a non-stop circuit of medication, dressings, and core medical needs, and the HCAs are there for washing, checking, toileting, dishing out and collecting meals, making sure folk eat and drink, etc, and there are multiple mini-wards each individual's responsible for (especially at night) then... it's impossible. The wards my mother was on would have needed at least five full time extra 'companions', and that might be an underestimate because wards are huge, disguised by the wardlet side rooms.
Ultimately there is simply no amount of money and job roles and best practice guidelines and good intentions that can replace family stepping up. I know society has become complicated, and everyone 'needs' to work to pay for what passes for 'living' these days, and having families later in life means a miserable, impossible clash of potential multiple care roles, but...
But something's got to change (not least of which the number of times I use the word 'and' in the average sentence). After a week I found myself muttering "there's no social care crisis, just a family care crisis" and the many, many Filipinos working in our local hospital seem quietly perplexed by the way UK society works. We're so much better off than they are, back home. But we're also far worse off where it matters.
I know it's easy for a semi-professional recluse like me to sit back and prognosticate on the state of modern family life. What would Billy No Mates know about such things? But... I dunno. Hospital is where rich, poor, close families, lonely souls, newborns and those at their last ebb all gather. The NHS is sometimes described as our national religion. If it is, then our hospitals are the Cathedrals... awesome and unbelievable to behold from a distance, but often crumbling and fundamentally flawed the closer you get.
But so are people. So's everything. I think the NHS is wonderful. I'm just not sure the British people deserve it these days... especially the bed blocker next to my mother for a while and the lady with a huge, close family that visited her daily, treated the staff like it was a hotel, and spent most of her day on the phone to distant relatives.
I think I'm done here. We had snow for a while this morning. Christmas is here! Now it's sunny. Mum is up and dressed and has had some of her medication and life is temporarily OK. I cannot fix society. I can't even fix me. But one evening I left Mum's ward at about 10pm after a tricky evening and there was a bloke sat near the cardiac ward all on his own, looking like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.
"Lonely places sometimes, hospitals," I offered as I passed. We ended up chatting for ten minutes about his poorly father, my worries about my mother's needs and overstretched staff, and the fact that family illness at least helped us forget the election!
We parted a little happier, as only passing strangers can. He thanked me for stopping to chat and I went off feeling I'd done something useful with my day beyond festering like an over-ripe tomato in Mum's ward all day. Life may be what happens while you're making other plans, but society is perhaps what happens when we reach out to strangers.
Here endeth the slightly longer second lesson. I haven't edited it for pomposity and typos.
Is it possible you can find out what sort of mattress mum had at the hospital
I'm pretty sure it's exactly the same type, but it's not been round the block a few times. But then Mum didn't sleep much in hospital either, in one go. I thought it was just hospital, but it might have been the mattress too. I certainly find it a bit on the firm side (and supportive, obviously) and Mum's always liked something on the soft side. Maybe too soft. I can probably use hers on the hospital bed, but I'll see what the OT says when she comes on Monday. Mum's leak-proof at the moment and she's not bedbound, so... we'll see. First I've got to get the hospital bed sorted out. I might wait til Monday though to report it because Mum slept most of the morning uninterrupted in her bed.