Scandal that shames Britain: Join our campaign to end appalling treatment of the elderly on NHS wards as complaints reach record high
By Daniel MartinLast updated at 2:03 AM on 2nd December 2010
Tens of thousands of elderly people are suffering appalling care at the hands of the NHS every year – pushing complaints to a record high.
For the first time last year, more than 100,000 patients and relatives were forced to issue complaints after being let down by the Health Service.
Hundreds of thousands more won’t have bothered to complain because they have so little faith that the NHS will listen.
Must do better: Complaints about the treatment of elderly patients within the NHS have soared
And we are backing their appeal to raise £100,000 to boost their helpline which helps angry NHS patients submit complaints and has become inundated in recent years.
The charity also wants matrons appointed at each hospital whose sole job will be to ensure patients are treated with respect and dignity and who will be entirely independent of hospital trusts.
The campaign comes only weeks after the death of the charity’s president Claire Rayner, who promised to return to haunt David Cameron if he did not improve the NHS.
Her widower Des vowed: ‘Let the haunting begin.’
Join our campaign to end the scandalous mistreatment of the elderly
The appalling treatment of the elderly in hospitals has pushed complaints to a record high.For the first time last year, more than 100,000 patients and relatives protested in writing.
Yet unless they were prepared to launch costly legal action, their only recourse was to complain to the very hospital which had let them down rather than to an independent body.
That is why the Daily Mail today backs a campaign launched by the Patients Association, a charity which has campaigned tirelessly for the better treatment of NHS patients.
Left alone: Elderly patients have been horrifically neglected in some cases (file picture)
They would be entirely independent of health trusts — meaning they can act in the best interests of patients, rather than taking notice of targets and finance.
The number of complaints about hospitals last year was up by more than 13 per cent — the biggest annual rise on record.
It represents growing anger at the needless indignity suffered by the elderly spending their final days on hospital wards and the callous attitude displayed by too many doctors and nurses.
And the huge volume of protests will be only the tip of the iceberg because hundreds of thousands more have so little faith that the NHS will listen to them they don’t bother complaining.
Calls to the Patients Association’s helpline have shot up in recent years — leaving it ‘inundated’ and unable to cope with demand. Its advisers deal with thousands of harrowing cases every year, some of which are detailed in a dossier collected by the charity and revealed in today’s Mail.
They include examples of frail and often scared elderly people left in their own filth, not being helped to eat or drink and screaming in pain but being ignored by nurses.
Campaigner: Claire Rayner's treatment was hit and miss, her family said
Underfunding means there is often nothing the short-staffed helpline can do beyond giving advice.
Two staff and one volunteer now have to cope with more than 5,000 calls a year — a toll which has doubled since 2008.
The charity is determined to take on more helpline staff to deal with the dramatic rise in complaints, so it can continue to shame the NHS into dealing with the growing problem.
The Daily Mail is backing its efforts to raise the £100,000 which would enable it to employ more advisers, who will be able to take up patients’ and relatives’ complaints with trusts to ensure they are properly handled.
When the charity’s president Claire Rayner died in October, her last words were: ‘Tell David Cameron that if he screws up my beloved NHS, I’ll come back and bloody haunt him.’ Yesterday, her husband Des vowed: ‘Let the haunting begin.’
And, in a foreword to the charity’s dossier, the couple’s son Jay reveals that while his mother’s healthcare over the last few months of her life was generally good, there were times when the health service got it badly wrong.
‘Those were the occasions when her nursing was assigned to agency staff who knew little or nothing about my mother and made no effort to find out, when calls for assistance went unanswered, when doctors treated her less as a person than as a set of conditions and readings on a chart.
‘She found this hugely distressing, but it also made her very angry.’ He added: ‘If she were here today she would have been hollering from the rooftops about it, berating politicians, health service managers and medical professionals alike.’
Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients Association, said: ‘Our calls are going up, and with the help of Mail readers we will try to make sure everyone gets the help they need.
‘Surely the essentials of nursing care are what every patient deserves and should get? The NHS should get this right all of the time.
‘There is lack of help with eating and drinking, lack of help with toileting needs. It is clear from the stories we hear on our helpline that too many patients are being badly let down.
‘Families are left with a life sentence of grief, with no lessons learned. The fact this problem hasn’t been properly addressed before is a sad indictment of our society. The whole complaints system needs to be reviewed urgently.’
Official figures show that complaints are on the rise across the NHS, with the elderly more likely than any group to have cause for complaint.
The NHS Information Centre statistics reveal that between 2008/09 and 2009/10, the number of written complaints to hospitals rose from 89,139 to 101,077 — the biggest year-on-year increase since records began.
Some 12 per cent of the 2009/10 complaints concerned the attitude of staff, while a further 11 per cent were because appointments had been cancelled at the last moment.
Another 42 per cent were about aspects of clinical treatment.
Almost half of the complaints were against hospital doctors, while nurses, midwives and health visitors accounted for almost a quarter.
NHS trust administrative staff — including managers and receptionists — were the subject of nine per cent of complaints.
I found Mum screaming in pain
Elizabeth Cavanagh: Calls were ignored
Raised in the East End of London, she survived the Blitz and the Bethnal Green Tube disaster. She worked hard all her life, first setting up her own clothing firm before opening a cafe which she ran until retiring in her mid-70s.
But the proud 88-year-old ended her days in an NHS hospital scared and screaming out in agony, her cries for help ‘ignored’ by staff.
Her daughter Patsy Dowsett 58, said: ‘My mother went through so much pain and neglect in a place where she should have received the best possible treatment.
'She was let down by the NHS when she needed them the most.’
Last November, the grandmother was admitted to Queen’s Hospital in Romford, Essex, with chronic heart failure after the care home where she had lived for a year became worried about her after a fall.
Mrs Dowsett, a local government consultant, brought her mother home-made food.
But although it was placed in front of her, other patients said staff did not help her to eat or drink.
The call alarm buzzer was also repeatedly left out of her reach.
One day, after using a bedpan, she was left calling for help and ‘in a very uncomfortable position — like a turtle on its back’, said Mrs Dowsett, who had twice to go and tell a nurse before anyone went to help her mother on the ‘understaffed’ ward.
Requests for painkillers were refused.
On another occasion she arrived to find her mother ‘looking like she was dead but still alive, screaming in pain, incoherent, clinging to the bed in a foetal position’.
Her mother also developed bedsores, which went undetected for days.
She was discharged on December 3, readmitted to hospital 16 days later and died on December 21 from a heart attack.
An investigation was launched after a complaint by the care home about the bedsores.
A report by the safeguarding adults team found that on the ‘balance of probability’ there was ‘neglect’. It also found her diet and nutrition should have been properly monitored.
The report added that the police were contacted for their stance and they advised ‘it would be a criminal matter if it was an individual who had the sole care of the patient. As it appeared this was the failing of the institution as a whole, they advised that the institution should investigate their own failings.’
Mrs Dowsett said: ‘My mother did not deserve to be treated this way and did not deserve to die in this manner. I want to make people accountable for their actions.’
A Barking, Havering And Redbridge Hospitals NHS Trust spokesman said: ‘We have offered our sincere condolences to Mrs Dowsett following the death of her mother and have tried to address the concerns that she has.
‘The trust works hard to continually improve patient care and patient experience.
‘Within the past few months we have introduced a range of new initiatives, including a visible leadership programme — which sees all of our senior nurses, including the director of nursing, back in uniform and back on the wards.
‘We have also started patient safety walk rounds with the executive team visiting all of our clinical areas, and successfully implemented a new system for ensuring that all patients who need help with feeding themselves receive the assistance they need.’
MY MOTHER WOULD BE SICK TO HER SOUL
By JAY RAYNER
For the most part, in the last, difficult months of her life, my mother — Patients Association president Claire Rayner — was looked after with true compassion and consideration.
But there were times when things went wrong: when her nursing was assigned to agency staff who knew little or nothing about her and made absolutely no effort to find out; when calls for assistance went unanswered; when doctors treated her less as a person than as a set of conditions.
She found this hugely distressing, but it also made her very angry.
As she said time and again, if even she — with her public profile, reputation for straight talking and knowledge of nursing and medicine — could not get the treatment she was entitled to, what hope was there for others?
If she had been alive today — she died in October — my mother would have been infuriated by the distressing accounts of poor nursing and medical care experienced by older people, contained in the very important report from the Patients Association.
Claire would have been the first to point out that many nurses and doctors are hugely considerate in the way they deal with older patients who may be confused, distressed or simply frightened by the situation in which they find themselves.
But any health system is only as good as its failings, and those detailed in the report are truly dismal. The Patients Association makes no apologies for the fact that this document will prove very difficult reading. But it must be read. The lessons must be learned.
Claire was a passionate believer in advocacy on behalf of those who could not make themselves heard, which was why she dedicated so much of her later life to the Patients Association and the absolutely vital work it does for those striving to receive the quality of care to which they are entitled.
If she were here today she would have been hollering from the rooftops about it, berating politicians, health service managers and medical professionals alike.
Instead, it is the stories of older patients themselves and their relatives that must be listened to. And they must acted upon. Claire Rayner would have accepted nothing less.
Claire Rayner: Passionate believer
But there were times when things went wrong: when her nursing was assigned to agency staff who knew little or nothing about her and made absolutely no effort to find out; when calls for assistance went unanswered; when doctors treated her less as a person than as a set of conditions.
She found this hugely distressing, but it also made her very angry.
As she said time and again, if even she — with her public profile, reputation for straight talking and knowledge of nursing and medicine — could not get the treatment she was entitled to, what hope was there for others?
If she had been alive today — she died in October — my mother would have been infuriated by the distressing accounts of poor nursing and medical care experienced by older people, contained in the very important report from the Patients Association.
Claire would have been the first to point out that many nurses and doctors are hugely considerate in the way they deal with older patients who may be confused, distressed or simply frightened by the situation in which they find themselves.
But any health system is only as good as its failings, and those detailed in the report are truly dismal. The Patients Association makes no apologies for the fact that this document will prove very difficult reading. But it must be read. The lessons must be learned.
Claire was a passionate believer in advocacy on behalf of those who could not make themselves heard, which was why she dedicated so much of her later life to the Patients Association and the absolutely vital work it does for those striving to receive the quality of care to which they are entitled.
If she were here today she would have been hollering from the rooftops about it, berating politicians, health service managers and medical professionals alike.
Instead, it is the stories of older patients themselves and their relatives that must be listened to. And they must acted upon. Claire Rayner would have accepted nothing less.
Terrible abuse of a proud man
David Perkins: Loss of dignity for a proud man
Mr Perkins, 71, an acclaimed wildlife artist, was in the high dependency unit at Southend Hospital in Essex after an operation to remove his bladder and cancer treatment. He died there in October last year.
His wife, also 71 and a supervisor at a residential home for children with behavioural problems, said she often found him covered in his own faeces and urine. ‘David was always a very proud man, he always kept himself immaculate,’ she said. ‘I was horrified to see his dignity taken away.’
Mrs Perkins was told that her husband needed extra pillows to prop himself up in bed — but she would have to buy them herself.
When she raised the problems at a meeting, she claims a manager said: ‘If you keep making these complaints the nurses won’t want to look after him and I won’t want him on my ward.’
She added: ‘Another time he said: “If that was me, I would’ve put a pillow over your face.” The other staff present seemed shocked he had said it, and he later apologised.’
At times, agency nurses were assigned to look after Mr Perkins, who served in the Royal Tank Regiment in the 1950s. But, said his wife, many of them seemed ‘uninterested’ and ‘would sometimes sit in the chair in his room fast asleep’.
Mrs Perkins, of Langdon Hills, Essex, said: ‘Two days before he died, I went in to find him covered in vomit. It had dried, so it must have been there for some time. It was all down his clothes and around his mouth.
‘I was at my wits’ end by then. I went back to the nurses and said: “How dare you leave him like this?”
They said: “We have 28 other patients.” I told them to go away, and that I would do it.’
She added: ‘David had not been in hospital since he was 11, to have his tonsils out, but when he needed the NHS it failed him.
I don’t want the same to happen again. It seems you have to fight the whole time to get anything like good care — and then fight when you complain.’
A Southend University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust spokesman said: ‘Mrs Perkins’ complaint is being investigated. We anticipate sending a full response in the near future.’
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Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1334850/Neglect-shames-Britain-As-complaints-NHS-treatment-elderly-soar-Mail-calls-action.html#ixzz16wKKTHSw
