Hospital ward faces ‘relentless pressure’
The Post has been granted exclusive access to hospital wards across Nottinghamshire to reveal the true extent of the impact of Covid-19. Here we show the scenes inside a City Hospital Covid ward during its busiest ever time.
PATIENTS of all age groups are admitted to Nottingham City Hospital’s Covid wards every day suffering and struggling to breathe with the disease.
From people in their 20s and 30s to married couples both suffering from the virus in hospital beds next to each other, services are under immense pressure helping to protect us from Covid-19.
Here, away from the Intensive Care Units where the sickest patients are looked after, patients are coming in from A&E, GP referrals or via 999 calls when they are transferred to the hospital wards.
Stretched staff rally and work together to get through the huge demand currently on the front line of the NHS which has never been busier.
Matron for Respiratory Medicine, Tracey Stevenson, said respiratory medicine is renowned for being busy in the winter with flu.
But, speaking to the Post from Fleming Ward at City Hospital, she said: “We’ve had one winter of busyness (in 2019) followed by a Covid pandemic of several waves - so it’s been relentless pressure for about a year.
“I’ve been a nurse for 22 years now and I would say this is the most challenging time of my career and probably all the nurses that we have working.
“We are under immense pressure, we’re managing acutely unwell patients that are really quite poorly and we’ve also got patients at end of life.
“But we’ve also got patients that have had treatment and are going home again. So we’re managing all three things.”
Some of the ward’s own nurses have been isolating because they’ve been in contact with positive cases or they’ve had Covid themselves.
But other staff have come in to support from other divisions to help in respiratory medicine.
Tracey added: “I am privileged to work with a very dedicated and hardworking, compassionate team of nurses.
“They do inspire me every day in the work they are doing and have really pulled together and supported each other during this time, particularly with maintaining patient safety and supporting one another with staffing.
“That’s what is getting us through - that team approach.
“Staff are also scared. They worry for their families and all the things we do outside of work to cater for this are not there, so that’s tough on them.”
On the wards, there are people on high levels of oxygen due to the virus.
Tracey explained they also have a unit where patients are on “noninvasive ventilation.”
Describing this, she said: “Positive pressure is administered via a tightly fitting face/nasal mask. If needed, we can add in additional oxygen.
“This helps patients to breathe more deeply, rests their breathing muscles and gives them time to recover.
“We are experiencing people of all ages in our wards. It is affecting all age groups.”
Despite it already being their busiest time, hospital bosses in Nottinghamshire fear Covid patient numbers will keep rising this winter.
“We need a plea to the public to follow the guidelines and what we’re being asked to do,” Tracey stressed.
“I’d encourage everyone to really support our healthcare professionals to reduce the transmission.”
Describing the strain of the pandemic, the Matron said the hope for the future is with the vaccine.
Staff have been touched seeing patients they care for heading to get their jab as City Hospital was set up as a vaccine hub.
“We’ve had some really heart-rendering moments,” she added.
“We had a couple who have come in at the same time and one’s been sicker than the other and we’re trying our hardest to keep them together in hospital.
“That’s something we’re not familiar with, having two very acutely unwell patients. These are husbands and wives together, that’s hard.
“I would say it’s been hard on the staff because of not having visitors in to the hospital, which is absolutely correct, but it’s hard to get the balance right but we’re trying to get that right for loved ones.”
Despite the pressures, NUH medical director Dr Keith Girling has been keen to stress the NHS is “still open for business” and people should not ignore symptoms or concerns.
Dr Girling added: “It’s a really important message that we have a health service that is not just a hospital service. We have fantastic community services, we have a really superb healthcare trust which provides us with mental health care support and treatment and we are very much working together as a healthcare system.
“Patients, the public, citizens really need to access the right part of that system for their healthcare needs.
“111, primary care, GPS, emergency departments are all open for business and we really encourage people to seek help with symptoms or conditions that they have.”