"I agree with the previous review"

My relative was in for 6 weeks due to a fall. While in there she became confusion and had delirium, with her age and other factors she needed a lot of attention, but there was not enough staff to meet these needs. This was especially noticeable at evenings and weekends.

At one point her notes recorded that she was found wondering the corridors one night. Upon checking her room it was realised the bed sensor was not plugged in!

On two visits that I recall I also found her buzzer was not working so she could not call for assistance.

She sort of fell/slipped out of bed 3 times as the bed was too high for her. It took 4 weeks to move her to another room with a lower bed despite me asking staff about getting a lower bed repeatedly.

She had various medical problems but staff did not seem to have access to her medical records. This caused problems they had no idea of her previous history or what to watch out for. No one seemed to notice she was hardly drinking for example and I had to point this out to staff on several occasion. I asked several times if staff could test for an UTI which she was prone to, but it was nearly 2 weeks before this was done and a UTI was found to be present. At one point a member of staff said they were going to check but forgot and would make sure they did this test the next day.

In the end following a complaint, I was called to say that usually when a person is admitted a junior doctor meets with relatives, but in the case of my relative this never happened!

Also male carers regularly wiped and cleaned my aunt - I didn't think male carers were allowed to conduct personal care on females but was told this was the norm. However since then other people have told me this should not have happened.

The staff themselves were friendly and the care assistants were clearly run off their feet. Far too many patients and not enough staff to cope. Pity as I felt the staff really did want to do their best but were under resourced. There was a chart on the wall detailing the minimum number of staff recommended and the actual amount of staff on duty. On a few occasions they did not meet the minimum requirement. However even with the minimum number present there was still not enough staff. The minimum should be just that - the minimum - it should not be regarded as the maximum.