I Suspect...

HEALTH is the issue.
Right now in Ireland, it is just about the only issue for many people.
I know about the health service because of my experiences with it and in it.
My experiences with it are good.
In it, not so.
I don’t know who designs hospitals. I suspect it is accountants. And I suspect they are on a bonus for every euro they save.
I suspect they make wards and rooms, waiting areas and doctors’ offices as small as possible.
I suspect they don’t bother including what might be called leisure activity areas for patients, not all of whom are confined to bed all day.
I suspect they say that it is up to the patients to decide what they’ll watch when there are two televisions between four or six.
I suspect they say the radios aren’t great and the earphones won’t last, but what the hell if there are no radios for the patients.

I suspect they say that the showers with the six inch steps up to them and the narrow doors aren’t actually very good, but they’re a great price.
I suspect they say that if they put in a decent kitchen, it will only result in the production of decent food and decent food costs money so let’s not bother.
I suspect they say that centres of excellence will be good for health but even better for budgets as long as we make most outlying patients pay their own way to get to them.
I suspect they say that it’s not their fault if people have to hang around hospitals all day waiting to see consultants so they’re not obliged to provide them with any diversion of any kind.
I suspect they say that if people spend six or eight hours a day visiting sick friends or relatives and then have to fork our twelve or sixteen euro for parking, that’s just efficiency.
I suspect they say that it would be too expensive, even if it is the right thing to do, for nurses and other staff who deal with patients, to be provided with clean and sterilised uniforms on their arrival at work each day.
I suspect they say it would cost too much to sterilise every bed every time a patients leaves hospital.
I suspect they think that medical care is all that counts. I suspect they think they pay doctors and nurses enough and I suspect they don’t really care if porters and cleaners and dinner ladies leave on a regular basis because, I suspect they believe such people don’t require training of any kind.
Mostly, though, I suspect those who make the decisions I suspect are made relating to patient care as opposed to patients medical care, are made by people who don’t use public hospital and who probably think they shouldn’t have to.
I suspect they have contempt for those damned costly patients.
And I suspect nothing will ever change.
Thank God that, at least in the short term, I’m at home watching my fourth rugby match in two days.
Couldn’t do that in hospital.
Reckon they suspect providing satellite television, even at a small charge, would just be too much damned trouble.

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Parole

Out of hospital at least temporarily. No tunnel required.
But it was an escape nonetheless.
I don’t like hospitals though I am likely to spend an awful lot more time in them in the coming years, assuming, that is, there are years coming.
Because patients come last.
No, not when it comes to medical care of course.
I doubt there is anywhere in the world where the medical care is better than it is in Ireland.
But, God, the hospitals are depressing. They generate depression where previously, there was none.
Small, claustrophobic, grey rooms with a television up on the wall in the corner and a radio that doesn’t work.
Most patients see medical staff only occasionally. Certainly, they see them as often as they must and more.
But whether in a ward or a private room, patients are left alone to their own devices for long periods of the day.
And it is, for me anyway, depressing beyond endurance.
I know how lucky I am that my family is just a couple of miles away and that I got to see them often. But when they weren’t with me, they may as well have been on the moon.
And while everyone does everything to deal with my disease, my head, at the same times, turns into a kind of mush.
I hear, on a daily basis, how wonderful our health service is going to be. It may very well be. Mary Harney and Brendan Drumm may well be right.
But to be perfectly frank and perfectly selfish, that’s shag-all use to me.
I say patients come last because, when it comes to the design of hospitals, when it comes to their ‘non-health’ welfare, if you like, little consideration is given.
Why are the rooms so dull?
Why don’t the radios work?
Why is the food so unappetising?
Why are six people expected to share two televisions?
I could write a very long list.
But, for now, I’m going to be brief and enjoy my break from hospital. I’m going to enjoy with with Connie and Charlotte and of course, Eric the mutt.
I may have to go back in again soon, depending on blood counts and what not.
I dread it.
But if it all works, sure, it will have been worth it.
Question is, why they couldn’t make it all so much more pleasant.

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