Short pr�cis of the two days:
Friday:
1 appointment but back half hour (couldn't find a bed)
2 surgery from 16:30 and 17:00
3 Lovely meal - battered fish/chips/mushy peas the apple pie and
custard
4 Took my evening tablets I had brought with me.
5 Bad night - lots of activity in ward - very sick patients. I was OK
but no sleep.

Saturday:
1 Breakfast around 09:00. Good choice of cereals and toast.
2 Nurse said the doctor would be round late morning to sign me out.
3 Around 11:00 nurse turned up to give me my tablets. When I said I'd
already taken them she was virging on rage. She asked to see then. I
listed through, 2 before breakfast, 1 with dinner in evening and 3 in
late evening. She took my meds from and wanted me to the full days tabs
at once. I refused and locked the tablets away and left. 10 minutes
later she almost sheepishly brought them back. She'd obviously talked
to a doctor to check.
4 Noon and no doctor yet
5 Lunch just a choice of sandwiches I chose the 'potted meat' -
remember that.
6 Nurse removed my canula and strapped on a cotton wool to protect the
small wound.
7 Nurse examined my pacer dressing and said that looks fine
8 It was then I saw copious amounts of blood. My pyjama sleeve below
the canula was drenched and dripping onto the leg and parts of my white
dressing gown.
9 Still no doctor, it was getting close to 16:00
10 17:00 Dinner. My dinner was minced beef pie with cauliflower and
sprouts.
The vegetables were OK but they'd given me minced gristle pie.
Yuk.
11 Still no doctor so I told the ward sister that I would take the self
discharge route.
12 A few minutes later I signed the relevant paper, sister left with
it.
13 I changed to ready myself for leaving.
14 Sister returned to say there was now a doctor on ward.
15 The doctor came to the nurse's station and busied himself at the
computer.
16 I went and asked him how long he would, he said he would be ready
when he had finished reading my notes and told me to go back to bed and
wait as he didn't like me standing over him whilst he was reading them.
17 Another quarter of an hour and he was still sitting at the computer
talking to one of his colleague.
18 I went back to see what was going on. As I reached him he reached
and handed me an envelope and said I could go. So you don't to check
the dressing or check that the pacer is working as it should. "NO" he
replied.

19 They usually do the pacer ops in the mornings and send patients home
the afternoon of the same day. The only reason I was staying overnight
was that there would be no one at home just in case some adverse
reaction occurred. So have the op in the one day and you are home well
within 12 hours. I my case it took 30 hours. I presume my bed was
unavailable for 8 hours longer that it should have been.
--
Heard messages are sweet but those Unheard are sweeter.
FN 2�22+. Mungo Brandybuck of Buckland..
flyingnun@roseofwhite.plus.com

On 25/04/2023 13:16, Flyi�g �u� 2�22+ wrote:
> So you don't to check
> the dressing or check that the pacer is working as it should. "NO" he
> replied.

This seems to be the pattern nowadays. If you tell the staff what to do
they get really uncooperative.

I had a blood test a few weeks ago. I am taking an anti-coagulant but
it isn't generally a problem. The nurse normally takes the blood,
withdraws the needle and quickly puts a cotton wool pad on the needle
hole. Usually I get a nurse who is happy for me to do what needs to be
done afterwards. I press on the pad just hard enough to gently compress
the skin around the hole. After a minute or so I ask for some sticky
tape to be ready and the cotton wool pad is stuck in place and I leave
it there until the end of the day, and when I take it off there is a
little bit of blood on the cotton wool, the puncture is sealed and I
have no problems with it afterwards.

The last time i had a blood test I got someone else. She took the
blood, and while she was doing that I explained to her I knew what to do
to avoid the puncture hole bleeding. However she put a cotton wool pad
over the hole with the needle still in it and pressed really hard as she
withdrew the needle. She held that pressure for about a minute then took
the cotton wool pad off to see if it was sealed and it wasn't and leaked
blood so she got another cotton wool pad and put that on and pressed
really hard and after a minute she lifted it off to have another look
and seeing it bleeding again she put it back and pressed hard for about
2 minutes. I told her that if she didn't lift it to look it would stop
bleeding. She pressed on it again for another minute to make sure, and
I asked her to put the sticky tape on it without lifting it, which she
rather reluctantly did. That time I left the pad on until the next day,
and when I took it off there was a lot more blood on the cotton wool
than normal and there had obviously been some leakage under the skin
which looked like a big bruise over 3 inches across which took a
fortnight to clear completely. All that because she wanted to be sure!

Jim

Indy Jess John wrote:
> On 25/04/2023 13:16, Flyi?g ?u? 2?22+ wrote:
>> So you don't to check
>> the dressing or check that the pacer is working as it should. "NO"
>> he replied.
>
> This seems to be the pattern nowadays. If you tell the staff what to
> do they get really uncooperative.
>
> I had a blood test a few weeks ago. I am taking an anti-coagulant but
> it isn't generally a problem. The nurse normally takes the blood,
> withdraws the needle and quickly puts a cotton wool pad on the needle
> hole. Usually I get a nurse who is happy for me to do what needs to
> be done afterwards. I press on the pad just hard enough to gently
> compress the skin around the hole. After a minute or so I ask for
> some sticky tape to be ready and the cotton wool pad is stuck in
> place and I leave it there until the end of the day, and when I take
> it off there is a little bit of blood on the cotton wool, the
> puncture is sealed and I have no problems with it afterwards.
>
> The last time i had a blood test I got someone else. She took the
> blood, and while she was doing that I explained to her I knew what to
> do to avoid the puncture hole bleeding. However she put a cotton wool
> pad over the hole with the needle still in it and pressed really hard
> as she withdrew the needle. She held that pressure for about a minute
> then took the cotton wool pad off to see if it was sealed and it
> wasn't and leaked blood so she got another cotton wool pad and put
> that on and pressed really hard and after a minute she lifted it off
> to have another look and seeing it bleeding again she put it back and
> pressed hard for about 2 minutes. I told her that if she didn't lift
> it to look it would stop bleeding. She pressed on it again for
> another minute to make sure, and I asked her to put the sticky tape
> on it without lifting it, which she rather reluctantly did. That
> time I left the pad on until the next day, and when I took it off
> there was a lot more blood on the cotton wool than normal and there
> had obviously been some leakage under the skin which looked like a
> big bruise over 3 inches across which took a fortnight to clear
> completely. All that because she wanted to be sure!
> Jim

I've been having blood tests for years now and this has never
happened before. With every new nurse,doctor or phlebotomist has
commented how good my veins are for access. But here, it seemed that
none of the nurses had been taught the proper way to take a BP
measurement properly. I had my BP taken several times during the day
and never properly. The nurses continued talking to me throughout the
simple, didn't take any time to relax first with my arm at different
positions. Even with the arm almost horizontal and stretched across her
little trolley.
It is a teaching hospital and I reckon we got all first year kids in
our ward.
--
Heard messages are sweet but those Unheard are sweeter.
FN 2�22+. Mungo Brandybuck of Buckland..
flyingnun@roseofwhite.plus.com