Filthy dirty hospitals

luckat · 26-01-2007 03:12PM #1

I was in hospital for tests - in Vincent's - the other day, and was horrified by the hygiene practices.

Two things: the person taking the blood test was wearing rubber gloves when I went in. She took the papers, riffled through them and started the procedure for the test. I asked her was she going to change her gloves and she stared at me, then laughed, and asked would I like her to. I said "if you wouldn't mind..." and so she shrugged, took off the pair she was wearing and dropped them in the bin.

Then she took out a fresh pair, *dropped one on the floor*, picked it up and put it on, and did the test!

And when I was being examined, the paper sheet over the surgical couch wasn't changed in front of me. When I sat up, I went to take off my shoes and was told "leave them on".

These are shoes that have been walking around the streets! On tubercular hawked-up mucus, flu-riddled vomit, dog crap...

I'm now supposed to go back for a small surgical procedure. I'm terrified and may wimp out.

What kind of experiences have others had?

Degsy · 26-01-2007 03:25PM

Was in temple street hospital a couple of times when i was a kid,one of the wards was alive with mice,they would be literally running round the skirting boards at night.The solution?The Staff Nurse got a mouse trap an baited it with my maltesers!

Wishbone Ash · 26-01-2007 03:32PM

luckat wrote:

I was in hospital for tests - in Vincent's

luckat - in fairness to the other St Vincent's (in Dublin and elsewhere), it might be appropriate to clarify which one you attended - presumably Elm Park?

User45701 · 26-01-2007 03:47PM

it should be cleaner but its not health care is important but id take the risk of infection over assault i think the hospitals are not a high priority and recorces should be devoted to an anti crime program. i don't have a problem with criminal gangs people who "take down scores" is one of the phrases. what i have a problem with is mindless assault or attacks for a mobile phone for 40 quid, someone who would rob an old woman ect.

luckat · 26-01-2007 04:39PM

Wishbone - this is the one down near RTE, the huge place.

User, there's no need to deprive hospitals because we need to pay for fighting crime. We have enough money for both. Look at the €184bn plan.

In any case, cleanliness is not expensive.

Schlemm · 26-01-2007 05:19PM

I can't believe some of the stories I've heard.

I worked in a vet practice recently and there was a girl working there who had previously worked as a cleaner in a hospital. She said that they scrubbed the floors more times per day in the vets than they did in the hospital.

My uncle was in Tallaght Hos for an intestinal blockage recently. He was on a trolley and kept throwing up everywhere. My Mam asked the student nurse to get him a fresh bedsheet when he threw up on it and she did nothing, she just stood there. I reckon a lot of the problems trace back to the way that nurses are trained these days: there's too much info on clinical stuff and theory and not enough emphasis on the 'hands on' side of nursing. Back in the days when the nurses were trained by the nuns, none of the problems of poor hygine arose. Doctors should get off their high horse and be able to clean up a mess when they see it too!

Another time in Tallaght my Mam brought my Uncle in for chemotherapy. He threw up in the lobby of the hospital and my Mam said to a staff member what had happened. When he was leaving the hospital hours later, nobody had cleaned it up.

The hygine in many vet clinics I've been to is second to none, considering that animals are coming and going all day for both consultations and surgery, and that animals are more likely to make a mess than a human. Most of the vet practices I've been to have very low post-op infection rates because of the good practices in hygine. There is always good leadership on these issues and I think that a lack of strong leadership in the health service for humans has let standards slip. MRSA is a disease which can be transmitted between humans and animals, but how many vet clinics do you see with MRSA problems??!

Given that people are so hung up about hygine and animals, I find the current situation in our hospitals is a disgrace. People consider animals to be such filthy dirty things and are quick to wash their hands after handling them, and yet we have a marked lack of handwashing in hospitals. It is crazy to think that you could go in to hospital in this country and send your dog to the vet, and your dog would probably fare a lot better.

Wishbone Ash · 26-01-2007 05:28PM

Part of the problem lies with cleaning being contracted out to private companies. Prior to that, domestic staff took some pride in looking after 'their' ward wheras an agency cleaner doesn't really have any attachment to their workplace and merely punches in the hours in a minimum wage job.

Schlemm wrote:

Back in the days when the nurses were trained by the nuns, none of the problems of poor hygine arose.

Yes, hospitals which were managed by religious orders were generally a lot cleaner.

Schlemm wrote:

Doctors should get off their high horse and be able to clean up a mess when they see it too

I disagree. They would be better off thoroughly washing their hands between patient visits.

TequilaMockingBird · 26-01-2007 05:37PM

Its an absolute disgrace. More people die in Ireland from MRSA than road traffic accidents. Just simple hygiene... IMO we should all be like the OP and insist that hospital staff adhere to hygiene regulations. Nobody likes to tell a professional how to do their jobs, but at the moment, they are simply not doing it and its endangering us.

InFront · 26-01-2007 05:43PM

Schlemm wrote:

I worked in a vet practice recently and there was a girl working there who had previously worked as a cleaner in a hospital. She said that they scrubbed the floors more times per day in the vets than they did in the hospital.

How small was the Veterinary surgery in comparison to the Hospital?

Originally posted by Schemm
Doctors should get off their high horse and be able to clean up a mess when they see it too!

If you think medical practice is dignified work, I'd have to say I disagree. Doctors are not cleaners, and neither are nurses, radiographers, dentists or sercretaries for that matter/ Cleaners are cleaners.

Originally posted by Schemm
MRSA is a disease which can be transmitted between humans and animals, but how many vet clinics do you see with MRSA problems??!

From http://www.bsava.com/

Small scale, referral hospital based stud-ies suggest that up to 10% of dogs may carry MRSA and approximately 3% of recent submissions to veterinary laboratories have involved MRSA, but these are obviously selected groups of ani-mals. There is therefore a need for large scale, epidemiological surveys to determine the true prevalence in healthy dogs and cats.

Clinicians and petowners who are immunocompromised are at risk of picking up an infection.

Originally posted by Schlemm
and yet we have a marked lack of handwashing in hospitals

Evidence?

A recent poll on AH about handwashing demonstrates that this is a problem that goes far beyond the medical community.

tabatha · 26-01-2007 05:52PM

this is not a joke or made up!

a guy i know went to this private doctor recently for a skin complaint. while there he had to strip. there were no curtains on the windows. the doctor asked him to stand in the window so he could see in the light. he never washed his hands before or after examining him. there was no soap in his room. there was no paper sheet on the bed he had to lie on. this guy had sores on his body that were weeping. he gave him a completely wrong diagnosis (was told by a doctor he seen at a later date). have since found out that this guy is considered one of the "top" in his area.

called to make a compalint as was told it wouldnt go anywhere so there was no point.

InFront · 26-01-2007 05:59PM

tabatha wrote:

called to make a compalint as was told it wouldnt go anywhere so there was no point.

The medical council said so?

There are bad doctors out there, but the point you make only really demonstrates there is one bad doctor out there. If you want to convince people otherwise you have to show a greater incidence of malpractice than one alleged example.

hunnymonster · 26-01-2007 06:08PM

At least with your GP service, if you're not happy, you can go somewhere else. This isn't really that case for hospitals due to their nature.

I quite often visit St James', The Mater and Tallaght hospitals. I've been to St Vincents twice in the last 2 months. My personal opinion on all these visits is that the hygiene is reasonable on the wards but the reception areas and A+E are filthy. A+E in the Mater public is what I can only describe as disgusting. I have tried to see if there is anything I can do about this but I've not gotten anywhere so far.

Wishbone Ash · 26-01-2007 06:23PM

InFront wrote:

Doctors are not cleaners, and neither are nurses, radiographers, dentists or sercretaries for that matter/ Cleaners are cleaners

The cleaning up of bodily fluids/substances can come under the remit of nurses.

Cleaners are usually employed for 'general maintenance' cleaning.

InFront · 26-01-2007 06:34PM

Wishbone Ash wrote:

The cleaning up of bodily fluids/substances can come under the remit of nurses.

I didn't know that and would be very surprised if it were actually true. Can a nurse or indeed anyone with a link confirm it?
The toilets at, for example, Beaumount have vomit in them from time to time. While I have never seen a nurse clean this up, I've often seen cleaners doing it.
Nurses sometimes clean up a mess in consulting rooms, but that's usually outside normal working hours when its hard to find a cleaner.
But I highly doubt that cleaning up bodily fluids comes under the official remit of nurses like you suggest.

luckat · 26-01-2007 06:49PM

I frankly don't care about the demarcation. I just want decent hygiene where there are sick, infectious, delicate people.

Why are we allowing this to go on? In Sweden, I'm told, shoes are handed in at the front door of the hospital and disposable slippers handed out to *everyone* who enters - doctors, nurses, porters, patients, visitors.

It's insane and obscene to allow filth to spread disease in hospitals, which should be sparkling clean.

Schlemm · 26-01-2007 09:31PM

luckat wrote:

I frankly don't care about the demarcation. I just want decent hygiene where there are sick, infectious, delicate people.

Why are we allowing this to go on? In Sweden, I'm told, shoes are handed in at the front door of the hospital and disposable slippers handed out to *everyone* who enters - doctors, nurses, porters, patients, visitors.

It's insane and obscene to allow filth to spread disease in hospitals, which should be sparkling clean.

Did anyone read the letter in the Irish Times recently about the fella who had an anaphylactic shock when he was in Denmark? The medical care he recieved would be hard to come by in this country.

The vet practice I was at was pretty big but the staff did the cleaning, whether it was the floors or the surgical instruments. Any of the large scale vet hospitals I've seen have been spotless too. There are plenty of zoonoses that anyone working in a vet practice is at risk of contracting, but hygine is usually of a high standard in most vet practices. I've also never been to a dental practice or a phyiotherapist etc where hygine is poor, and I've never heard anyone complaining about such a situation.

When my Mam was in the hospital with my Uncle she said she saw nurses and doctors going between patients without washing their hands or without washing their hands thouroughly. There was a documentary a few years back where some ppl went undercover in a hospital in the UK as cleaners. They found that the staff were taking shortcuts and weren't following instructions at all. People are taking shortcuts and no one group can be blamed for the spread of MRSA in Ireland. Anyone who has taken shortcuts with their hygine is responsible, doctor, nurse or cleaner. Are the cleaners for the hospitals specialised in cleaning hospitals?

The government seem so out of touch with the situation too. On the late late the other night there was a fella from the HSE saying that they measure a patient's waiting time at A&E from when they get to see a doctor. No wonder they are so incompetent!! Mary Harney just doesn't seem interested. Someone like Maurice Nelligan, who has a sharper acumen, years of experience and an obvious passion for reform in the health service, would be much better suited for the job

Wertz · 26-01-2007 10:34PM

Wishbone Ash wrote:

Part of the problem lies with cleaning being contracted out to private companies.

Agree 100%.
Lost count of the hospital toilets I've been into where there's no toilet paper and laughably, a public info sign asking you to wash your hands....right next to an empty soap dispenser, and all this overlooked by a little clipboard on the back of the door claiming that "This area was inspected at X time by Y" and Y's signature next to the name of the contract cleaning company

I've worked in a good few hospitals (painter and decorator) and I've seen a lot of stuff that patients and even staff simply don't see; clear a room/ward/theatre of it's furnishings foir a repaint and the amount of crap you find, hidden surfaces a half inch thick with dust and lint, corners absolutely stinking dirty grime on walls in supposedly sterile areas....and for the most part the few coats of paint and a quick go of a mop is all it sees before it's back to business as usual.
We once did an intensive care unit in a regional "centre of excellence" (!?) that's re-opening was delayed by a test showing positive for a particularly nasty superbug called VRE....it took them about a month of "bombing" (gassing the room) to make it safe to use. During all our time working in it (~2 months) and our crew traipsing about the rest of the hospital no-one ever realised what we could have been spreading on our boots or on our hands.

Don't even get me started on hospital kitchens...

Some head doctor a few weeks back in some interview put it well: he said something about everyone working in the medical institutions needing to do their jobs to the point of excellence and that the cleaners jobs were just as important as the head surgeon....cleaners and catering staff need to understand why it is that things need to be clean, that it's more important than it looking clean and that lives depend on it.
I've seen my mother in our local hospital where I've witnessed some terrible hygeine practices and have feared for her wellbeing more than I should have to...
In that same hosptial I witnessed a cleaning frenzy in the A&E dept one summer afternoon....it turned out that some team of infection control auditors were about to perform a "surprise" inspection....seemingly somebody in management had been tipped off and it was all hands on deck :rolleyes:
Heard many months later that that hospital passed.

Part of the problem in all of this too is the over management and the needless desk jockeys admining over every little bit of the process.....channel all those over priced wages into the areas where it makes a difference and put half those fat bitches out on their ear....more, better paid cleaners, less contract cleaners, better training for nurses and housekeeping staff and more money into creating sterile surfaces (there are anti microbial paints available for sterile rooms but they cost ~20 times more than normal wall paint so rarely get used)
The only places I've ever seen this stuff used was in private wards and units and one operating theatre....

Frightening stuff.

de5p0i1er · 27-01-2007 07:07AM

Lets face it the health care in this country is a disgrace, theres nothing we can do exept move to a better country if we want the health care we deserve.

luckat · 27-01-2007 10:57AM

"A better country"? I can't agree with that, de5p0i1er. But we do need to demand proper health care - and especially basic standards of hygiene.

Heinrich · 27-01-2007 11:15AM

de5p0i1er wrote:

Lets face it the health care in this country is a disgrace, theres nothing we can do exept move to a better country if we want the health care we deserve.

If only we could move the Harneys and Aherns to another country or better still planet!

We are paying for a health service and that precisely is what we deserve. Unfortunately the powers that spend OUR money do so very badly. Incompetence is what it is called. Iy you do your job that way you will get the boot.

Contracting cleaning to save money is very bad practice. We need to clean rather than save money. The idea of having rosey figures on a balance sheet whilst having filthy hospitals is downright crazy.

Let's face it, Ms Harney is doing a bad job which she opted to do in the first place. This is simply based on the colossal mess the health service is in and that is in EVERY area thereof. Results are what counts and these have nor been forthcoming. He latest stunt with the veiled threats to the consultants is going to be another shambles. Farcical!

When one is asked what the most valuable thing to have is the reply is invariably one's health. Money does not enter into the equation!!!

As much money as is necessary (more in the case of the present Government) will always be extracted from the taxpayer to pay for services. What is now needed is action. It would not be too difficult to employ more competent cleaners and supply them with some bleach at €1.00 per litre along with some mops and rags and clean under the beds and in the toilets.

No sir, we are entitled to what we are paying for and suggesting that we move elsewhere is simply grotesque!

luckat · 27-01-2007 12:39PM

Maybe it's just that Irish people have a rather... lackadaisacal attitude to cleanliness generally?

Actually, I think this is no longer true of people's *homes* and *persons*, though it used to be (though not in the North) years ago. People are now stringently cleanly in their personal washing and the care of their homes.

But people don't seem to make the same connection with public life. I get on buses all the time and find that people have thrown down papers, Coke tins, even sandwiches and chips on the floor or left them on the seats. And in work, people often leave their desks in ****, leave dirty dishes strewn in the breakout areas, etc. And on the streets, people litter and spit.

kelle · 27-01-2007 12:53PM

Schlemm wrote:

Did anyone read the letter in the Irish Times recently about the fella who had an anaphylactic shock when he was in Denmark? The medical care he recieved would be hard to come by in this country.

Didn't hear about this- could you enlighten us?

luckat · 28-01-2007 12:36AM

The Danish healthcare story: Simon Ball wrote to the Irish Times on January 15 this year saying he'd eaten nuts inadvertently (he's allergic) and gone into shock.

He went to the nearest A&E. He could scarcely talk at this stage.

A nurse saw him immediately on arrival and gave him adrenaline.

Within one minute he was admitted, put in a spotlessly clean room and given oxygen and the other treatments necessary.

After his condition was brought under control he was monitored by two nurses and a doctor, all of whom were Danish and spoke perfect English.

That evening he was advised to stay overnight and transferred to a room in the main hospital, where he was constantly tested to make sure the allergic reaction was under control.

On leaving he was checked out comprehensively then given a detailed computer printout of his treatment in minute detail, and a detailed letter for his Irish doctor.

There was no charge, as "healthcare is free in Denmark".

(By the way, Denmark is the same size as Ireland, with a similar population size.)

InFront · 28-01-2007 12:40AM

There's nothing very outstanding about that tbh, apart from the fact that it is paid for only out of taxes.

I don't think the care that people receive in Irish hospitals is generally called into question.

It's getting in that can be the biggest problem here.

Wishbone Ash · 28-01-2007 12:43AM

luckat wrote:

There was no charge, as "healthcare is free in Denmark".

(By the way, Denmark is the same size as Ireland, with a similar population size.)

Aren't Income Tax rates are much higher there?

luckat · 28-01-2007 02:13PM

Income taxes are much higher almost everywhere than in Ireland, as far as I know. But of course it's not only *income* taxes that pay for hospitals.

The care people receive in Irish hospitals is certainly the best that the hospitals can afford.

But if this doesn't extend to basic hygiene, in hospitals riddled with bacteria that cause serious illnesses, surely that in itself is a failure in care?

fly_agaric · 28-01-2007 06:25PM

InFront wrote:

Doctors are not cleaners, and neither are nurses, radiographers, dentists or sercretaries for that matter/ Cleaners are cleaners.

Yes. Nurses are now very highly educated/trained staff - kind of like of mini-doctors. They now consider themselves too good/important to do any cleaning/housekeeping type work.
This work can be done by the contract cleaners (maybe the ones who put in the lowest, juciest bid + -> maybe treat their workers the shíttiest??).

This wasn't always the case however (afaik). Nurses used to clean stuff at times and the real "cleaners" were employed directly by the hospitals they worked in.

luckat wrote:

Maybe it's just that Irish people have a rather... lackadaisacal attitude to cleanliness generally?

Yes, I think that must be it! But people seem to believe hospitals were actually cleaner in the past (when there was no dental flossing and whitening, daily hot showers, laser waxing+dermabrasion etc) so how would that fit in with the filthy-dirty potato-munching savages theory?

professore · 28-01-2007 06:32PM

User45701 wrote:

it should be cleaner but its not health care is important but id take the risk of infection over assault i think the hospitals are not a high priority and recorces should be devoted to an anti crime program. i don't have a problem with criminal gangs people who "take down scores" is one of the phrases. what i have a problem with is mindless assault or attacks for a mobile phone for 40 quid, someone who would rob an old woman ect.

You wouldn't say that if you were dying from hospital acquired MRSA due to poor hygiene practices.

antSionnach · 28-01-2007 06:56PM

fly_agaric wrote:

They now consider themselves too good/important to do any cleaning/housekeeping type work.

Tbh I think most people would have that opinion of nurses. Taxpayers don't pay for the education of medical professionals so they can mop the floors. If I'm in hospital I certainly don't want a nurse coming near me whose just been down on the floor with a J-Cloth.

Wishbone Ash · 28-01-2007 07:04PM

antSionnach wrote:

If I'm in hospital I certainly don't want a nurse coming near me whose just been down on the floor with a J-Cloth.

They may have just cleaned up a patient who has soiled themselves/vomited on themselves in the next bed. What's the difference?

InFront · 28-01-2007 07:14PM

Sure why not have them taking out the bins while we're at it?

Simply because you want to minimise their exposure to filthy environments, that's why there should be competent cleaning staff as opposed to busy nurses mopping floors or cleaning up waste. There is a danger in having contact with human waste, yes, but that's no reason to make it worse by asking someone to wash the toilets.

There is also a serious ethical question with regard to paying an awful lot of the taxpayer's money in educating nurses and other busy medical practitioners while apparently expecting them to switch their focus to household duties. That's not what the nurses, or any of the medical staff, are there for

I think as someone else mentioned, we also don't have enough nurses aides in this country.

Filthy dirty hospitals

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