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The seminar arose
from concerns expressed to the Health Group that
health professionals and carers were less careful of
the sick and elderly than heretofore.
The results of our NCW survey “Feeding the
Elderly” seemed to confirm this.
Betty Lordan,
Co Chair Health Policy Committee introduced
Professor
Betty Kershaw, DBE, FRCN, Past President of The
Royal College of Midwives, who has involved herself
in nursing education worldwide.
Dame Betty chaired the day with charm, humour
and a firm hand.
Patricia Marquis,
Regional Director, Royal College of Nursing,
West Midlands
entitled her talk “Is Nursing in Good Health?”
Referring to the perceived lowering of
interest in each patient, she reminded us of the
changes in medical and surgical techniques and
approach.
There is an increasingly rapid turnover of
in-patients and there is now seldom time to form the
relationship a nurse and patient might want.
In the past decade the focus has been on
achieving targets and keeping down expenditure
There are more than 90,000 students in the UK at
any one time, with an attrition rate of 25%.
They are taught the essence of care
but many feel they cannot be the nurses they wanted
to be.
The topic ‘Caring for the Carers’ was addressed by
two speakers from Herefordshire Carers’ Support:
Margaret
James, Manager and
Patricia
Stokes, Information and Development Officer and
Nicola Howard,
of the Princess Royal Trust for Carers.
There are six million carers in the UK who are saving Government (that
is, us) £87 billion per annum.
Margaret and Patricia presented a long list
of attributes and qualifications required by carers
which included patience, perseverance, nursing,
accountancy and others such as requiring little
sleep, no sick pay and on call 24 hours a day which,
whilst raising some laughter, underlined the sad
reality.
Nicola referred to the 1.5 million in the UK caring for
someone with a mental health problem.
50,000 of these carers are children or young
people whose situation is often unrecognised and
whose own emotional and educational development can
be affected.
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Barbara Kuypers,
Local Supervising Authority Midwifery Officer for
the West Midlands,
said that there are 15 local supervising
authorities, responsible for 2,500 supervisors and
35,000 midwives.
In describing her service, she said that
supervision is not a complaint service; but it can
be used to negotiate a change of midwife or care
package.
The audience expressed anxieties concerning
the standard of midwifery and the Health Committee
continues to pursue these concerns.
Linda Playford,
Nurse Consultant in the Mental Health Services
Department of the Birmingham and Solihull
Mental Health Foundation Trust spoke of the need to
maintain dignity for those with dementia and for
their carers. She
also referred to Age Concern’s research document
“Hungry to be Heard”, the findings in which were
confirmed by NCW Health Committee’s own survey.
The recommendations were that older people,
their relatives and friends should be listened to;
all ward staff must become “food aware”, hospital
staff must follow professional codes on nutrition
and routinely assess for signs of malnourishment.
Tracy Fereira,
from “Home Instead” (which recently won a regional
“Dignity in Care Award”) said that in her area,
Solihull, there are 29,000 people over
65 years and they generally want to remain in their
own homes.
This international company offers non-medical
personal care such as daily shopping and grooming
and most especially, companionship.
Dr Fouad Siddiqui,
a Consultant
Physician in the Department of Geriatric Medicine in
Sandwell and
West
Birmingham
Hospitals, based his
well illustrated talk on the theme “Dignity and
Care”.
We know that ours is an ageing population.
He gave examples of the different aspects of
‘Elder Abuse’, contrasting with the basic human
rights that older people should expect – dignity,
nutrition, toileting, mobility and the right to
independence. Dr Siddiqui described the history of
Department of Health national standards and service
models and knowing of the Health Committee’s work on
the subject of Nutrition, dealt with this in detail;
malnutrition in hospitals is being addressed and in
the hospital in which he works, admirable guidelines
are in place.
Dr Siddiqui had
demonstrated that the structures for good care are
in place; we should be unafraid to monitor
performance from all care-givers.
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