"Poor staff attitude"

A member of my family was admitted into ward 32 with issues with her diabetes and while some of the staff are lovely and couldn’t do more for her, that can’t be said for all of the staff unfortunately!

She never had anything happen directly with her and thankfully the care she received was fine, but the care I and she witnessed other patients receive was below par, staff rolling their eyes at patients who are taking too long to do something, staff loudly verbalising their dislike for certain patients, the staff constantly talk about each other, especially on nightshift when they thought everyone was sleeping. They constantly swear at each other and to the patients, especially patients who have learning difficulties or maybe dementia or something.

Like I said they were always okay with my mum, but I think that’s because she didn’t need any help to move or wash and my mum would feel bad if she did have to press her buzzer after hearing staff complain loudly about buzzers going constantly. Hearing the staff talking about each other isn’t great, especially when you’ve heard what they’ve said and then you see that staff member in the next couple of days knowing what the other staff think of them, it’s just awful. It puts the patients in a very awkward situation and if they’re saying that when they’re in their place of work around patients, I dread to think what they’re saying behind closed doors. They have conversations about other staff members over the top of other patients as they’re changing them and they talk about other patients while doing this too.

She said you constantly hear the staff swearing and on nightshift they’re so loud and incredibly inconsiderate, laughing loudly, shouting down the corridor at each other talking at full volume as they’re changing other patients, there’s no consideration. I seen on this website that the NHS was based around patient centred care, when really I think it’s based around what care you need and how much the staff are willing to do for you (only some of the staff though, there are some in there that would go above and beyond for you.) In my view, it's absolutely not what the NHS used to be years ago, I believe they should bring back matrons.

The ward was absolutely filthy as well. Soiled linen overflowing in laundry bags, a patient in the bay next to my mum had wet theirself and you could see it through their blankets and they sat like that for hours, the smell getting worse and worse and staff had come in and changed their position in between this. The bay was absolutely stinking and I had to eventually say to one of the ones in light blue about the patient and they were very apologetic, they said that they weren't in their team or something and they weren't aware and couldn’t have said sorry enough and they immediately went and washed the patient and changed everything and tidied them up. Their nightgown had dried in food and juice on it where they'd spilt it on theirself at lunch time and this was now supper time.

There was dinner dishes still lying, my mum had had no water since lunch time and I’d been and gone and come back again and I had to ask for some when I got back. The list is endless.