"Abysmal care, staff like headless chickens and..."

What I liked

I have to say that my Grandad was admitted to ward 20 in December 2012 and the care he was given was appalling!

He was admitted due to massive weight loss and failure to eat which turned out to be a perforation of his duodenum. He was put onto TPN for over 2 weeks to help him heal, and the consultant then decided that he should be put onto a light liquid/citrus free diet and encouraged to eat.

His 1st meal was a roast lamb dinner and of course made him very sick! Grandad continued to be unable to eat and encouragement was non existent by the staff and we had to rely upon other patients to keep us in the loop as to what was happening with his eating patterns as the staff just continually told us that he's eating little and often....complete lies!

He was then moved to a side room as he was found to be a carrier of a bowl condition, this is where he was totally forgotton about and it is claimed that he was being barrier nursed. He was free to roam the ward use the day room and same toilet as the other patients. Like i said he was forgotton about and when we questioned the staff about barrier nursing as they did not wear aprons/gloves etc they told Grandad that he should be telling them when he needed the loo....Grandad suffers from dementia and forgets, something that we had to constantly remind the ward staff about!

My mother and I had several meetings with Grandads consultant who assured us that they were encouraging him to eat etc and that the meals would be bland etc...days later they were still supplying him with citrus drinks and hard food!

Grandad continued to lose weight and continued not to eat and the staff and consultant did not seem to see any issue with this despite him getting weaker and weaker by the day.

On the final meeting with the consultant and ward manager we again expressed our concern of his care, and we were so concerned we even asked staff members if Grandad had been placed on the pathway care plan, and the ward manager openly laughed about it!

What could be improved

Ward staff and consultants that actually care about their patients and want to see them get well before shipping them off to St Marys rehab center before they are well enough to go there!

Reading patients notes would be a help too!

Grandad has now been re admitted again due to failure to eat and more weight loss.

Our Grandad is dying right in front of our eyes and non of the staff at DRI seem to care!

Our complaints etc is bypassing PALS and we are going straight to CQC, and if Grandad passes away I shall be holding each and every one of the staff members responsible!

I doubt very much that this thread will show up on the website as it shows the massive failure of care given to my grandad on consecutive occasions!

Anything else?

I was horrified to be laughed at by the ward manager about our concerns about the pathway care scheme.

I was disgusted that Grandad was discharged despite the staff knowing that Grandad wasn't eating,

We asked too many questions about the failings of the team on ward 20 including the consultant. I would request that someone contact us as I have every intention of going to the local and national press and his local MP.