Post Office Sell Off - Welcome To Tory Britain

[gpick24]

Originally Posted by Guinness

Hmm....ok around £45 for a 37 hour week before tax above minimum wage, and for nurses £150 for 37 hour week before tax above minimum...bloody pedants

So HCA`s are on just over £1/hour above minimum wage, my Mrs must be a fully qualified nurse then, never noticed her going to uni.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by gpick24

By the way, if the NHS really want to save money on nurses, they should employ more of them. That way, they wouldn`t have to use agency nurses so much at £28/hour.

Absolutely spot on, just think that £28 is a little lite, last year I was on 3 different wards and I bumped into one nurse on all three wards

[Margaret Pilkington]

Originally Posted by Guinness

Margaret, in the main I think you are agreeing with me. I already pointed out that nurses are not doing the job that they are supposed to, they are doing more, they are doing the job of doctors and being paid nurses wages. The people who are doing the dictionary definition and traditional Florence Nightingale nursing are healthcare workers and they are being paid just above minimum wage. Trust me I am very grateful that ALL of these guys are around.

The point of contention between us is the amount of hands on basic nursing that university qualified nurses do. Like you I speak from personal observation not from political propaganda or watching Casualty. I don't for one moment think that nurses are useless, I just think that their role has been changed from the traditional hand holding, brow wiping and pillow pumping reassurance to triage, prescribing and having to maintain continuous professional development by going on countless training courses instead of being observationally assessed by the matron on a daily basis.

These changes have been made by the constant interference of government to get healthcare on the cheap and pave the way for private healthcare.

And once the NHS implodes, we will have a glut of university trained nurses who will be scrambling for jobs in the private sector driving down the wages on offer as supply exceeds demand. Like I said, win-win for this government.

Of course nursing has evolved...it has been evolving since the days of Florence Nightingale....it has had to do this to keep up with modern technology processes and procedures.

And the university qualified nurses DO still participate in hands on care hands on care...but they have HCA's to help them do this.
It is a case of getting the work done as a team.
When my daughter was in hospital for five weeks earlier this year, her care was delivered by caring individuals who did what was necessary to make her comfortable...whether that was to empty her catheter bag, administer pain relief, or change her vomit bowl and give her a mouthwash. I saw the ward sister do this on more than one occasion.

If you do not have a doctor available and a patient needs an IV line re-siting, what would you rather have?
A nurse who is qualified to do this - and get on with it...or wait and let the patient become dehydrated because it does not fit with the traditional brow mopping vision of a nurse?

Nurses have long wanted to do these roles because they are on the spot when frequently a doctor is not....and they know it benefits the patient.
I did not go into nursing because of the pay...in fact I left a very well paid job in industry to go and follow my dream.

I cannot generalise why nurses go into nursing today...but the ones that I know go i nto it to make a difference to the lives of patients.
Nursing has changed...it is going to continue to change, this change cannot be stopped.
Nurses work as a team, with the HCA making a valuable contribution to the care of patients...this is good for the HCA and also for the patient.
Some of the finest lessons I learned were from auxiliary nurses - those untrained precursors of the HCA...and at last someone has recognised their value and given them training to do other things than wipe bottoms and do baths

As for your comment on CPD(continued professional development) this doesn't have to done by taking courses....you can do it at the place of work and by studying stuff that the professional journals provide.

British trained nurses are welcomed with open arms all over the world.
I cannot ever see there being a glut of trained nurses.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Originally Posted by gpick24

By the way, if the NHS really want to save money on nurses, they should employ more of them. That way, they wouldn`t have to use agency nurses so much at £28/hour.

That is spot on...except the hospital pays more for an agency nurse that the figure you have quoted.
Whe I was senior sister of my unit, I would juggle staff around rather than having to bring in agency nurses - nurses who didn't know either the patients or the layout of the ward...and who you used to have to spend more time wet nursing, than letting them do the job they were being paid to do.
More nurses on the wards would mean the deployment of staff who actually know the patients would be possible .......and it would save shedloads of money!

[Mog]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

That is spot on...except the hospital pays more for an agency nurse that the figure you have quoted.
Whe I was senior sister of my unit, I would juggle staff around rather than having to bring in agency nurses - nurses who didn't know either the patients or the layout of the ward...and who you used to have to spend more time wet nursing, than letting them do the job they were being paid to do.
More nurses on the wards would mean the deployment of staff who actually know the patients would be possible .......and it would save shedloads of money!

Margaret, 2 things in life I don,t like. 1 is Bad ale. and 2 some of the Clowns on here who can do nothing but cut and paste. One thing that I do like though are people like you who talk sense and can back up whatever they say due to experiences in life and profession. I have to say that every experience that I have ever had in the hospitals in this great country of mine have always been very good apart from the last one. If it wasn't for some of the members of your profession, I would not be writing this now. You are 100% right with what you say regarding nurses and agency staff. I have just had an operation in the William Harvey Hospital in Kent. Not one English Doctor or Surgeon did I see in the 3 days I was there. Only 2 English nurses were available to cover 3 interconnecting wards with a total of 24 patients. Everybody else, foreigners. From the Agency nurses to the tea and dinner ladies to the ward cleaners. The recognised spoken language for the wards apart from the 2 English nurses was East European. Whatever happened to Matron.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Mog, thank you for your vote of confidence.
I am no longer in the profession, having retired quite a while ago.
The Matron thing gets my goat too.....once upon a day, a very long time ago...the Matron was the figurehead of the hospital...she said 'jump' and not only did you jump, but you asked 'how high and how long do you want me to stay up??'
Matrons were long gone when I did my training and had been replaced by Nursing Officers......just another layer of management....which could be done away with(although my Nursing Officer - a Mr John Whalley, was noted for scrubbing up and assisting in gynae theatre...and turning his hand to portering duties too)
The matrons who are dotted about the hospitals today are much like these Nursing Officers, and were a sop to public concerns about the way the NHS was going...a political Google Page Ranking stunt.
Politicians aren't much good at running the country(unless you call running it into the ground 'running').
If they left the running of the NHS in the hands of those who know best how to do this, then things would be far better.......The NHS is like a vast ship...it takes a long time to stop it in it's tracks and turning it round after it has been steered in the wrong direction is a feat in itself.

[gpick24]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

That is spot on...except the hospital pays more for an agency nurse that the figure you have quoted.

You`re right Margaret, the £28 is what the nurse is paid (or so i`ver been told), the agency will also get paid, so I would guess it will cost the NHS more like £40-£50 per hour.

[gpick24]

Originally Posted by jaysay

Absolutely spot on, just think that £28 is a little lite, last year I was on 3 different wards and I bumped into one nurse on all three wards

Doesn`t necessarily mean they were agency, staff get moved around quite regularly, my mrs often works in different departments and sometimes even different hospitals, and then there are bank shifts as well.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Many people who start out as HCA's go on to become qualified nurses.
The NHS has a duty to maximise the potential of every member of staff(that is what a big part of appraisal is about). In this way the member of staff benefits because they are allowed to develop and grow...the patient benefits from people who have skills that are needed in a health care setting.......and the NHS gets the best from the people who work within it...now, if only the government would stop its meddling, it would be a better organisation by far.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by Mog

Margaret, 2 things in life I don,t like. 1 is Bad ale. and 2 some of the Clowns on here who can do nothing but cut and paste. One thing that I do like though are people like you who talk sense and can back up whatever they say due to experiences in life and profession. I have to say that every experience that I have ever had in the hospitals in this great country of mine have always been very good apart from the last one. If it wasn't for some of the members of your profession, I would not be writing this now. You are 100% right with what you say regarding nurses and agency staff. I have just had an operation in the William Harvey Hospital in Kent. Not one English Doctor or Surgeon did I see in the 3 days I was there. Only 2 English nurses were available to cover 3 interconnecting wards with a total of 24 patients. Everybody else, foreigners. From the Agency nurses to the tea and dinner ladies to the ward cleaners. The recognised spoken language for the wards apart from the 2 English nurses was East European. Whatever happened to Matron.

Certainly agree with most of what you say mog, but circumstances change with different hospitals. Like you I have been treated on a few occasions and in 7 different hospitals, but there is always one constant, nursing, only ever come across two nurses who were useless, which is a very low percentage over 34 years

[kestrelx]

Originally Posted by cmonstanley

and while the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. who is going to gain from this? yes thats right camerons mates .i wonder where and when he went to dinner with them ,paid by the taxpayer to give tax payers a raw deal.

TNT have started posting letters round my way - I think they mainly do mass mailout deals for big companies like banks and finance companies, not single personal letters, yet anyway. The guy comes on a push bike with the logo on stands it outside and then delivers by hand. I would think the Royal Mail will always run the mail boxes. But at the end of the day there is too much competition to have a monopoly on it?

[cmonstanley]

tnt another foreign firm who avoid paying full tax .there will be nothing british owned thanks to the tory lies. we are the party for Britain = fail we will get tax dodgers = fail we will keep the nhs = fail tough on immigration = fail they are liars or incompetent . if milliband has anything about him he would re-nationalize royal mail , the utilities and the railways. that's billions £s more to leave the economy and the country. tnt are pulling a flanker by taking the government to court because whoever buys the royal mail will start with a 20% reduction in their vat, when in fact they could turn round and buy the royal mail on the cheap. say hello to 3 days a week post. this is nothing short of treason.

[Less]

Originally Posted by cmonstanley

tnt another foreign firm who avoid paying full tax .there will be nothing british owned thanks to the tory lies. we are the party for Britain = fail we will get tax dodgers = fail we will keep the nhs = fail tough on immigration = fail they are liars or incompetent . if milliband has anything about him he would re-nationalize royal mail , the utilities and the railways. that's billions £s more to leave the economy and the country. tnt are pulling a flanker by taking the government to court because whoever buys the royal mail will start with a 20% reduction in their vat, when in fact they could turn round and buy the royal mail on the cheap. say hello to 3 days a week post. this is nothing short of treason.

What is nothing short of treason?

Which of the above ramblings is it?

Foreign Companies?
Tax dodgers?
The party for Britain?
Immigration?
Liars?
Milliband?
A 3 day a week postal Service?
All of the above?

Or

Your corruption of the Queens English and any type of logical thought?

[Margaret Pilkington]

Less, Cashy has a very good saying......it goes like this...'you can't put sense where there is none'
It is very true in the case of this member.

He remembers all of the things he can lay at the door of the Tories, but none of the things perpetrated by Tony Blair and his cronies....in his eyes(though he may now tell you differently - he never mentioned it at the time) they could do no wrong.

Politicians are politicians...they aren't in the job to make life easier or better for the electorate, but to line their pockets and to secure a place on the gravy train for themselves.

[walkinman221]

Originally Posted by jaysay

Absolutely spot on, just think that £28 is a little lite, last year I was on 3 different wards and I bumped into one nurse on all three wards

Bloody hell John three different wards no wonder the nhs is on its knees