"End of life care"

I feel I must share my experience of the care my late mum received from staff on ward 10. My late mum had been an inpatient on ward 10. During this time I felt care was very poor and communication non existent.

I have been a nurse for 25 years and I have never experienced such awful lack of compassion empathy or care as I did in the last few days of mums life.

We as a family were told there was nothing more they could do for my mum, that was difficult enough to deal with given that my brother had died in January and my dad had died in March. But the end of life care my mum and my brother and I received we felt was shocking if non existent.

The most disturbing parts were one evening as we were about to leave after being there all day was when mum got very distressed and agitated I asked nursing staff if mum could have something, I could not tell whether she was in pain or agitated. The nursing staff entered room gave mum something and when we went back in mum still appeared distressed she was crying.   at that point my brother I and his family decided to stay on asking nursing staff what they thought.  the nurse who gave mum the drug said my mum was fine she had not needed the drug she had given. we decided to stay and not one nurse looked in on mum for 10 hours.

The next day I discover the nurse had given mum medication to dry up secretions. my mum did not need this she had no secretions! It is not surprising mum was agitated they had given nothing to help her.

On questioning a nurse about end of life care she said they do not have time for any care plan! On the day mum had died mum was very agitated and kept flinching as if in pain. I asked nursing staff if mum could have something for pain.

A nurse came to the room looked mum up and down then said she was fine( this nurse had not seen mum all morning in fact no nurse had looked at mum that morning). This nurse then proceeded to prod mum up and down like a sack of potatoes and then tell me she was fine.

I questioned them when they then told me and my family that it was their professional right for a second opinion, and went to get another nurse.

This nurse entered the room looking very embarrassed telling us they know how we feel and then said she looks a little distressed with her breathing.

A doctor then enters room saying they do not think mum needs a pump as mum had not needed enough drugs. My brother and I then got angry saying we did not want mum to have a pump we wanted some pain relief as mum was screaming out.

My brother told nursing staff not to come anywhere near us again we would tell staff when mum had died. I had to keep reminding staff although I was a nurse I was also a daughter.

My mum got one dose of morphine after lots of unnecessary distress and died a peaceful death 4 hours later. I have never experienced anything like it in my 25 years of nursing.

I work in the acute setting and face patients dying every day and feel these patients and families deserves to have as much care and compassion as the patients getting better. At no time in the week leading up to mums death did a palliative care nurse come to see us. We were offered a cup of tea twice in that week and mum must have been checked on a handful of times. My mum deserved better not the undignified death she experienced.