"elderly nan after surgery"

Anything else?

Thought I would start with a positive 1. the ward was clean 2. the nursing students were fantastic and should be proud My nan and our family did not have a great experience during her 16 day stay after surgery. Although the knee replacement surgery went well she contracted septicaemia less than 24hrs after surgery. At no point during this did any doctor, surgeon, consultant or nurse notify us of this. My nan and our family battled for days of on going tests and drugs to be told "We don't no what's wrong". It was 2 years later when she got told she needed a hip replacement that we found out that she had septicaemia. 7 out of the 9 nurses that were allocated to my nan during her stay were rude, disrespectful and clearly had no true knowledge of patient care and communication skills. One of the 'nice' nurses there had even commented on how the other nurses lacked in motivation and for most it was just a job!! nobody wants to hear this when they have a long stay ahead of them. Another problem was that diabetic medication was not being given appropriately (being left on the side behind my nan so she did not no it was there and not waking her for medication) and the doses even managed to change substantially while blood pressure tablets were completely stopped as on arrival her blood pressure was normal - well of course it was normal she's been taking the tablets for the last year! The effect of stopping the blood pressure tablets caused my nan to be bed bound for 1 week after coming out of hospital she was constantly dizzy, nauseous and eventually got swollen legs. The community nurses were no better when she arrived home. she was on a long course of clexane that was supposed to be administered at approx 5pm every night but they would randomly turn up at gone 8pm, no phone call at all. After 4 days of this happening I complained to the manager and showed my nan how to administer it her self and we stopped all community nurses coming round for this. My mum and I became her community nurses.... On the positive side the physiotherapists were fantastic we could not fault them and out of courtesy they would ring if they were going to be late. I failed to mention at the beginning of this that I am in fact a nurse myself I found the nursing care shocking and quite frankly I would feel ashamed of myself if I ever treated any of my patients or families the way we were treated. Needless to say we will never use the inpatient services again