Patients dying unnoticed or suffering miscarriages in corridors. Elderly people with dementia soiling themselves because there’s no one to help them to the toilet. People forced to have treatment in bathrooms and car parks.
These are just a few of the distressing scenes nurses across the UK have witnessed with the health system under immense pressure, forcing hospitals to treat patients in any available space.
More than 5,000 nurses shared their stories with the Royal College of Nursing, with many saying they felt embarrassed or ashamed to work for the NHS because of the lack of care they were able to provide.
As a senior nurse from the south-east put it: “Nurses don’t go into this profession to give bad care, and we give our utmost in horrendous situations, because there’s nothing else we can do.”
Here are some of their stories.
Dying unnoticed in the corridor
Too many patients spread across ward bays, corridors and store rooms has meant patients often receive delayed care, or worse.
One nurse said: “We have had multiple patients unexpectedly deteriorate and arrest in the corridor. A patient died in the corridor but wasn’t discovered for hours.”
Many nurses reported patients going into cardiac arrest while in corridors.
“This morning staff left in tears as we had a cardiac arrest in a corridor where we couldn’t move the bed to the resus area as there were other patients on beds blocking access. Sadly this lady died,” a nurse said.
Another said: “A patient had a cardiac arrest in the corridor by the male toilet and died.”
Breaking bad news in crowded spaces
There is little privacy or dignity for patients when hospitals put them in corridors for care, nurses said, meaning that deeply personal and private conversations are had in busy areas with many people around.
“We have had to review patients and break bad news in the A&E corridor,” one nurse said. “We told a patient he was dying as patients were wheeled past and orders shouted across the unit. How is it fair to tell someone they are dying in a corridor?”
A nursing support worker said she struggled to find a private space for a 95-year-old woman, who was stuck dying in a corridor for hours with more than 30 patients around her.
“The family couldn’t thank me enough for getting that space organised, but she spent eight hours, nearing the end of her life, in a corridor space in front of a patient who was detoxing from alcohol and vomiting and being really abusive, and another patient in front of them and who was in a lot of pain, and who was screaming and shouting,” the worker said.
“There was no dignified care at all, no care at all.”
Patients stuck sitting in urine
Several nurses spoke about the lack of dignity available to older frail patients, with many having to be changed in public or semi-public areas.
One nurse said a lady with incontinence was stuck in a corridor with no space available or privacy, so nurses could not help her.
“The lady remained in wet clothes and bedding until there was a bed space available for us to use … I felt desperately sorry that my patient was in that position through no fault of her own.”
Another nurse said: “I have seen a patient using the bedpan whilst in a corridor bed where patients, visitors and staff can see.”
A nurse said watching a scared 90-year-old lady with dementia wet herself in a corridor broke her.
“[She screamed] as she was urinating in the bed after asking several times for help to the toilet and having to wet herself there on the trolley and dripping onto the floor,” the nurse said.
“Seeing that poor helpless lady, someone your grandmother’s age, frightened and be subjected to animal like conditions. It’s disgusting.”
Regular aggression and abuse
Because of the lack of space and staff, nurses said they are often faced with angry patients and relatives.
“I have often seen staff frightened and distressed by this situation,” one said.
Another said: “There was an aggressive abusive person in the corridor who caused a disturbance on his trolley and he frightened our patients in the corridor. Security were called but the patient was not suitable to be removed.”
One nurse witnessed a colleague being physically abused.
“The patient was extremely aggressive and was banging my colleague’s head [into the] wall,” they said.
An emergency nurse said abusive behaviour had made her question whether she should remain in the job.
“I’ve been spat at, I’ve been threatened with an acid attack, I’ve had staff assaulted, like throttled in our waiting room and threatened with weapons,” she said.
“The impact on that every day makes you question why you’re working this job, why you keep going.”
