THE NATIONAL HEALTH.

I know nothing about this, but thought it would make a good discussion. A lady that I teach had an accident whilst in England and ended up in a hospital where because of her injury was placed in a geriatric ward. She was really worried and got repatriated here for treatment, and said about the new gadgets and gizmos that they have in hospital now like computers, telephone, etc., on a type of bed thing. She said that calls to and from the hospital cost an absolute fortune. Surely all the money spent on stuff like this would have been better spent on the Health service itself. I have not been to a UK hospital for such a long time, but wondered what members experience of them is.

I did some work experience in a few different hospitals - some community and larger hospitals, like the one in Wrexham. I have to say I think the NHS gets quite a bad rep unfairly, as a hell of a lot of work and money goes into everything. I visited haemotology, pathology and histology departments as well as a few wards and the amount of care and concern for patients is really commendable. Especially in places where the name is just represented by a sticker on a test tube - and it's not like just a few people are concerned about patients - all the staff work exceptionally hard for very little money.
Here's a crazy fact - for every pint of blood that's donated, the NHS has to pay £120 to decontaminate, store and pay those who collect and transport it. When you consider how much is used, that's quite a lot of money...

I know that the cost of using those phones that they wheel to your bed are quite high especially if you phone in to them from the outside then you are paying premium rates. They are not so bad if you dial up but are more costly than a normal pay phone.

The thing is they at least allow people to make calls which was not the case many years ago and whilst it may look like making a profit on the back of an ill patient there is the cost of putting the technology into the hospitals to be recovered by the operating company.

Personally I do not see why they cannot allow restricted use of mobiles within certain hours of the day as I have never seen any proof that they actually do interfere with machinery.

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Personally I do not see why they cannot allow restricted use of mobiles within certain hours of the day as I have never seen any proof that they actually do interfere with machinery.

But would you risk having a machine fail because you decided to call a mate on your mobile ?

atticusuk wrote:

Personally I do not see why they cannot allow restricted use of mobiles within certain hours of the day as I have never seen any proof that they actually do interfere with machinery.

Have you ever had your mobile phone next to a computer or speakers? Every couple of minutes a phone sends a signal back to the providers (thats how they know where you are!) and it interferes with any electrical equipment. Like Thingywhatsit said - it wouldn't exactly fill you with confidence if the screen on your heart rate machine kept flickering on and off!

Actually someone mentioned the old trolley phone. That's what I remember, but the lady that was in hospital in England two weeks ago said that there is an arm thing above the bed with television, telephone and computer. Goodness me that's a lot of money for each bed.

Next they'll be having Sky Digital!
I think that cleanliness is an issue that was sorted out once and for all. When I visited an elderly friend of the family a while ago, the floors were dirty and worst of all bloody tissues all around her bed. We complained but the hospital said the cleaners had a lot of work to do, and couldn't keep going back around the wards. Lisa x

lisa2062 wrote:

Next they'll be having Sky Digital!
I think that cleanliness is an issue that was sorted out once and for all. When I visited an elderly friend of the family a while ago, the floors were dirty and worst of all bloody tissues all around her bed. We complained but the hospital said the cleaners had a lot of work to do, and couldn't keep going back around the wards. Lisa x

I agree, I was in hospital last month for an op and one of my drains leaked all over the floor - I had to point out the blood to the cleaner as there is no way he was going into the corners otherwise. The floor cleaning was about the same standard as my kids would do in the kitchen.

I must say, I did like those tele things though and I'm sure they do work out cost effective, it cost £3.50 a day for all the tv and radio that was available, which was the usual small selection of sky channels and all terestrial and then you paid for the phone calls on top.

THey are one of the biggest cons going.

IT's not about Health service money, though. THe money is provided by the company who install the kit (Patientline is the biggest)

THey then make their money from the patients (and their relatives)

My Dad was in hospital for several weeks. THeir phone bill was astronomical. 49p a minute and the first minute is a recorded message (whicgh the caller pays for) telling you about the costs, but you still ahve to listen to it!

I think their phone bill was pushing £1000 and he was only in hospital for a few weeks of the billing period.

And of course that didnt include the times when he bought the phone card and dialed home, ( I think he got 20 minutes on a card and I think they were £3 or so)

I agree that having something like internet access for £3.50 a day is a good thing, but as a lot of people in hospital might not necessarily use the internet and want to have phone calls, then it's a racket and the government ought to be ashamed of itself for allowing it (it's not like you can phone the ward any more)

People have enough worries without having to pay phone bills where they have been ripped off, my Mum could have hired a personal driver for three weeks for less!

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IT's not about Health service money, though. THe money is provided by the company who install the kit (Patientline is the biggest)

Thank heavens for that. I thought the NHS had gone crazy installing these things. She said that her bill was excessive.

It is one of those crazy public private finance initiative ideas which imho should have been stopped (along with a pile of others)

helencbradshaw wrote:

(it's not like you can phone the ward any more)

Must be an English thing - I called my Gran in a ward in Stirling Royal Infirmary recently. They wheeled the phone right to her.

[quote="Sam_Garland"] I have to say I think the NHS gets quite a bad rep unfairly, as a hell of a lot of work and money goes into everything. quote]

Yeah but the thing with the NHS is that the Government keep pouring money into it, but they need to sort out the problems as to why all this money is going and the service is'nt improving, until they repair the foundations, I cant see the point. its like a buscket with a hole in it, u pour more water in, but it all comes out the bottom!!

drewboy wrote:

helencbradshaw wrote:

(it's not like you can phone the ward any more)

Must be an English thing - I called my Gran in a ward in Stirling Royal Infirmary recently. They wheeled the phone right to her.

I guess they would if you pushed it with them...nurses probably have sales targets of phone cards (Oh cynical me now!!)

THey have patientline across England and Scotland though. tHere is another main system too, forget its name, however the Breakfast TV people did a "scoop" not long after my Mum got her fantastic phone bill which had more digits than her phone no.

spoilt_little_brat wrote:

Sam_Garland wrote:

I have to say I think the NHS gets quite a bad rep unfairly, as a hell of a lot of work and money goes into everything.

Yeah but the thing with the NHS is that the Government keep pouring money into it, but they need to sort out the problems as to why all this money is going and the service is'nt improving, until they repair the foundations, I cant see the point. its like a buscket with a hole in it, u pour more water in, but it all comes out the bottom!!

There will never be enough money for everyone. I think the fundamentals are we treat the symptom not the cause. My eldest sister is a nurse of 20 years standing and I find her attitudes quite frightening sometimes! (very negative towards alternative therapy for example, based on no fact whatsoever!!!)

Equally on the occasion when I had to visit QMC recently there were more staff sitting around doing nothing in A&E. Probably all needed on the night shift, but wasted at 10am on a quiet Tuesday. THat frustrates me about the NHS, as I see it so often.

spoilt_little_brat wrote:

Yeah but the thing with the NHS is that the Government keep pouring money into it, but they need to sort out the problems as to why all this money is going and the service is'nt improving, until they repair the foundations, I cant see the point. its like a buscket with a hole in it, u pour more water in, but it all comes out the bottom!!

Yeah, I suppose so - but it's hard to tell what the foundations really are. What woud they need to 'repair' to make everything else work more efficiently?

Working conditions, administration, operating costs, site costs, location, management accounts, expansion, in-out patient care, charging people for non-emergency treatment that a doctor could have done, etc, etc, etc.

So... everything?

in a nutshell, yes.

trouble is, they get these fancy administrators in to save them money, they charge a fortune and actualy lose them money.

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Yeah, I suppose so - but it's hard to tell what the foundations really are. What woud they need to 'repair' to make everything else work more efficiently?

How about an insurance based medical care for those that can afford it, leaving those that cannot aided by the instant injection in funds from the insurance jobbies ?

Ha, NO!

Why not Angus, it works very well here and injects money into the system without making those that cannot afford it suffer.

Ha, still NO!

Do you think it would work on the NHS though?

Not as long as people get stung for NI.