Forum Topic

hospital cleaners and servers of food

St Georges at Tooting have decided cleaners should now also serve food.  At first reading, this appears to be a health and safety impossibility. Am I missing the point here?

Barbara Shillabeer ● 2696d6 Comments

A disaster waiting to happen in my opinion.

Sue Hammond ● 2696d

I might be wrong, but wasn't it usually the nurses who served the food. The cleaners used to be a company like sodex or something.

Barbara Stevens ● 2696d

The NHS has an enormous shortfall in the number of trained medical staff it needs.  They recruit from abroad for nursing staff.  It seems they have been contracting out as many services as they can.  In one where I spent a long time on the wards tje food was delivered to the beds by someone from one of these companies.  She was only allocated a short amount of time to deliver all the meals including the tea round and to collect and clear everything and get it back to the kitchen etc.  This was a ward for mainly the elderly.  The packaging on the sandwiches and the little plastic tubs of finely chopped salad and grated cheese or tuna for the baked potato was impossible for many old fingers to open.  The tea was too hot when poured so was often out of reach but there was noone to move it closer when drinkable in between delivery and collection. So then it was too cold and these patients in great need of hydration missed another chance of it. To be more palatable and less dry and tempt the appetite food  was often in need of salad cream or dressing/sauce of some sort but if there was any it appeared in little plastic packets which nobody could open and even if there was a nurse (exceedingly rare) she or he wouldn't have a pair of scissors.Food is an essential part of the getting well process and how it was ever allowed to be taken out of it is mind boggling.  A case of being fixated by the numbers on the excel sheet and not being sufficiently engaged with a more holistic approach.If you want people to get well quickly and leave hospital you will do your best to see that they eat well.  When recovering from surgery the smell of the trolley of food can be enough to put you off eating so this can be tricky as can having to eat whatever the person in the bed before you ordered before they left and the lack of flexibility.In many hospitals the shortage of staff will mean that the staff themselves will not manage to eat properly during their officially 12 hour shift which can generally turn into longer once all writing up and handover is completed safely.Keep up with your IT skills and hearing and seeing examinations so you can communicate for yourself with your friends and family if you can.  Age Uk often runs courses for IT or can help with finding specific help.  (They found a volunteer to take my blind 90+ parent to visit his partner in hospital so we didn't all need to go so often.)In some hospitals there are volunteers who go in at lunch-times to help.

Philippa Bond ● 2694d

Appalling :-( Have we become a third world country?

Lucille Grant ● 2694d

Apparently, I jumped the gun a bit.  A friend who works locally in a hospital says it is normal practice.  When you are interviewed for a job now, you agree to additional training so you are able to be used in both jobs. if you don't agree, no job. There is an official name for it but I've forgotten what she called it.  Perhaps someone on the forum could investigate further? Wonder how the pay rate is worked out?

Barbara Shillabeer ● 2694d

I hope that everybody has learnt from the Carillion scenario when it went bust there were several hospitals who all lost services at the same time.  (And some services I understand weren't running well in the run up.)Please communicate your experiences so that decisions aren't all made by bureaucrats well away from the situation  who have not heard any feedback!  Age UK is a good avenue but there should be others although they may not be willing to listen.Everybody in hospital needs a friend and the staff are often run off their feet and can't do all the communicating for you.

Philippa Bond ● 2694d