In a magazine interview she said: "If you're demented, you're wasting people's lives, your family's lives, and you're wasting the resources of the National Health Service.”
I was shocked and angry that such an offensive statement should be made by one of our legislators, and reported widely in the media as if it was a legitimate comment. This woman is preaching Nazi ideology (that mentally ill people have worthless lives and should be exterminated). She should be publicly disgraced and sacked from the House of Lords.
In the last two years of her life my mother was developing Alzheimer’s disease. She was “ill” one or two days a week. It was an exhausting process for my brother and myself to look after her, especially as she had several other illnesses (we got no practical help either from the NHS or from my sister and eldest brother).
Eventually my mother went into the local hospital because of a stomach disorder (this was in June 2003). In hospital she was immediately infected by MRSA and died two weeks later. Her death certificate says she died of a heart attack, and because I had never heard of MRSA I didn’t challenge this (the Registrar was very unwilling to put on the certificate the cause of death as stated by the hospital, and lots of people were giving me hints about the real cause of death, but at the time I didn’t want an autopsy).
Afterwards at least one of the family said the MRSA had been a blessing (even though she had personally never lifted a finger to help us).
Anyway, the point of my writing this is to say that neither my brother nor I thought the death was a “blessing”. We paid taxes all our working lives to support the NHS (as did my parents) and yet when we most needed help the help wasn’t there. But even without help we would have carried on.
I suppose what I am really saying is that I am still ANGRY at what happened to my mother, and I don’t want “liberal intellectuals” implying that it is alright to ignore or neglect elderly people with dementia because they are a waste of NHS resources. The way elderly people are cared for is a scandal. The resources should be increased, not reduced.
And another thing that annoys me is how politicians (all parties) go on and on about how “wonderful” the NHS is and what a “wonderful job” NHS nurses do. Only one nurse on my mother’s ward made any effort to look after her – the rest were uninterested. In my experience nurses are not wonderful – they are lazy and ignorant and kill people because they can’t be bothered to wash their hands.
Money has been poured into the NHS for the last twenty years and yet it hasn’t improved.
The NHS needs a bloody good kicking.
Above: Moral Hazard is an American novel by Kate Jennings about a couple in New York (I bought the book in 2003 when I was reading all I could about Alzheimer’s). In the novel the husband develops Alzheimer’s and his wife takes a job on Wall Street to earn enough money to pay for his care. It’s an interesting comparison between the demanding life of a finance executive and the equally demanding life of a carer.
The book is also a reminder that not everyone in the financial sector is a greedy “fat-cat”. There are “fat-cats” in all walks of life, including fat-cat doctors on £150k salaries, not to mention fat-cat politicians with every luxury and excess you can imagine. I don’t mean to defend greedy financiers – I just want the condemnation shared out fairly.
5 comments:
Yes, Lady Warnock, stupid and offensive.
But "[nurses] are lazy and ignorant and kill people because they can’t be bothered to wash their hands" is unfair and offensive, as is "The NHS needs a bloody good kicking".
But excusable, I suppose, after your own experience with your mother.
All I can do is tell you what I saw.
There were about six nurses in the ward, five of them indifferent, one of them more concerned with how I felt rather than concerned about my mother (I kept wanting to tell her "I'm not the patient").
One example: because she caught MRSA my mother was receiving anti-biotics which were fed into her hand, but because the anti-biotics made her delirious she kept pulling the feed out. The nurses made no attempt to check this or put it back in unless they were specifically asked to (luckily there was a patient in the bed opposite who made them do this the first week, but she was moved the second week so it didn't get done unless I or my sister was there).
There is another incident which is too personal for me to write about but which I will not forgive those nurses for.
The other non-nursing staff were also uninterested. Under the bed (which I saw when getting my mother's suitcase) there was dust and fluff and old tissues. The doctor literally shrugged his shoulders when my sister asked him when our mother was going to have her operation.
If they knew she was dying (which seems obvious in retrospect) they should have TOLD us she was dying and I would have taken her out of that filthy and uncaring place so she could die in her own bed.
The only nurse who showed any interest was from the floor above. I don't know how she became involved but she came down to meet me and said "You do know what's happening don't you" (I didn't know as no-one was telling us anything and I was too stupid to ask - I was still stupid enough to trust the NHS). Anyway she said she would get "her doctor" to look at my mother, and this doctor prescribed some different antibiotics.
The other nurses and domestics on that ward shuffled around as if they couldn't care less.
I get angry whenever I think about all this, but I am also angry with myself for letting them get away with it. I was too shocked with the condition of my mother and inexperienced with the way hospitals worked (I have never been in hospital myself except when I was about four). Whenever I found my mother neglected (which was twice a day as I visited twice a day and sat with her as long as possible) I should have SHOUTED THE PLACE DOWN. And I still feel like going back there and having a go at them.
The GP told me my mother's death was totally unexpected, and he kept insinuating that I should make a complaint, but he must have known about the condition the hospital was in before he sent her there.
Plus all the fuss around what to put on the death certificate makes me feel sick when I think about it.
Sorry to burst your illusions Tony (whoever you are) but in my experience six out of seven nurses are lazy shits.
But then, Andrew, whoever you are, your experience is very limited, isn't it?
But it is 100 % experience.
And I assume from the pompous way you are using your title (on a blog!) that you have a vested interest in defending the NHS, therefore nothing you are going to say is impartial.
So please take yourself away from this site.
I have had enough of "doctors" for the time being.
Go and spend some of your £150k plus salary.
Just a couple of points. Actually I have no title as I am a retired consultant surgeon, and as you know we are plain Misters. I put in the "Dr" just to make clear my partiality (well spotted, Andy!), which is based on 45 years experience of working with nurses in three countries. Oh, and my late wife was a nurse.
This leads me to believe that "six out of seven nurses are lazy shits" is a very foolish assertion and beneath contempt.
However, no hard feelings: I shall follow both your recommendations to the letter, spending my income happily, and visiting your website no further; I can't think why I did so in the first place.
Farewell.
Post a Comment