KT Dodge

Archive for February, 2008

I’ve read another article today about bad nursing care and cleanliness in one NHS hospital Bath’s Royal United Hospital . Lord Mancroft was appalled at the dirty wards and poor nursing care. However, he did have a choice as he was swiftly transferred to a private hospital, lucky him. But many of us who get sick and cannot afford private health care fear the prospect of entering into the ‘lottery’ of NHS hospital care.I must say that Andrew’s care in the oncology out-patients ward at the North Middlesex Hospital is very good and the nurses are nice and efficient. If there are delays it’s usually because chemo has not arrived from the Pharmacy … which is frustrating. Sitting in the waiting room for treatment we are constantly hearing stories of patients who have arrived at 10am and are still waiting for treatment at 2.00pm because their chemo hasn’t arrived. Now this kind of stress is not good for any patient especially someone suffering from cancer. Obviously, here it seems to me that it is not the ‘nursing’ care that is disorganised it is the ‘administration’ side that lacks management. The communication between different departments seems amiss.Andrew has chemo that lasts 48 hours and has to wear a bottle which continuously drips into his body. After 48 hours a District nurse has to remove the bottle and re-dress his arm. We asked for more dressings for Andrew at the hospital (as they gave us a bag of them at the beginning of his treatment and these had now run out). We were strictly told by one of the nurses that these had to be supplied by the District Nurse not them, as it should come out of their budget. Financial awareness from nursing staff is now commonplace in NHS hospitals and surgeries. Unfortunately, it is much more evident that financial constraints affect the care of patients in the NHS and how expensive a treatment is takes priority over whether you get it or not. We are constantly being told how much the chemo is costing as it’s being administered …. which is actually something a patient does not need to hear at that time.Well since we didn’t want the dressings to come out of the hospital’s budget we asked the District Nurse to order more supplies .. this was greeted with, you need to get them from your GP not me. I challenged this unhelpful response and she agreed to fax the GP and order more supplies. It seems to me if they can ‘pass the buck’ they will.

As you may or may not already be aware, members of the Watcher’s Council hold a vote every week on what they consider to be the most link-worthy pieces of writing around… per the Watcher’s instructions, I am submitting one of my own posts for consideration in the upcoming nominations process.

Here is the most recent winning council post, here is the most recent winning non-council post, here is the list of results for the latest vote, and here is the initial posting of all the nominees that were voted on.

On our way to dinner last night we came across a frog sitting completely still on the pavement.  I was pretty surprised at this as I’ve never noticed any frogs before on the busy pavements where i live …. then it clicked, it must have sensed the oncoming UK earthquake that we had last night …. next time I will pay more attention and read the sign!

Well as I am not a customer of the failed mortgage lender Northern Rock I really am not delighted by the announcement that the government is going to nationalize Northern Rock with tax payers money.  It is estimated that this public ownership decision will cost the tax payer in the region of 2k each.  For me this is just another nail in the Gordon Brown government’s coffin. 

I was interested to read a recent article in The Telegraph regarding the differences between healthcare in the US and the UK.  It says that the obvious difference is that in the UK we have the NHS and health care for all, whereas healthcare in the states is reliant on ‘private health care schemes’.  

The article is written from the point of view of an ex-pat family who have health cover via the husband’s job, she seems to think that without private healthcare in the states you do not receive healthcare. This is wrong as there is health care for ‘uninsured’ people in the US and a whole variety of different schemes to help you if you ‘can’t pay’.

She states that Private Healthcare is expensive in the US if you’re employer isn’t supplying it, but healthcare is expensive wherever you pay for it, no less so in the UK. Having experienced both NHS care and ‘private health care in the States’, I would never try to compare the two. There is no comparison .. but how can there be??? State run healthcare is never going to be the same as ‘private’ healthcare!! I think the NHS machine struggles as it tries to do a good job but due to financial restrictions will always fail a percentage of people with long waiting lists or misdiagnoses, because the whole ethos is you’re getting care ‘for free’.

A new film is being released on February 28th, based a bank heist in 1973 at Lloyds Bank in Baker Street.  It seems that there was more to this robbery than just ‘looting the money’,  it seems there may have been compromising pictures of one of the royals in the heist too.  It all sounds fertile stuff for a film and I am looking forward to it especially as it’s written by Dick Clement.

Well everything I read lately is proclaiming doom and gloom financially, high inflation, more house repossessions and a pretty depressing financial outlook ahead as the credit crunch takes hold.  The only consolation is that generally these downturn’s are cyclical and do not last forever.  So hang in there everyone!

Well I’ve had a good amount of auditions recently, all for women in their 40’s reminding me that I am actually rapidly approaching middle age - arghhhhhh.  Unfortunately, nobody wants to give me their acting job at the moment.  As you never get feedback from auditions it is really hard to know if you actually did something wrong .. although nine times out of ten they don’t choose you because you just didn’t look like the picture they had in their mind for the character.  I remember when I got cast as ‘Agnes Tebbitt’ in The New Statesman, the Director coming up to me in rehearsals and asking why I wasn’t wearing my glasses … confused I asked what glasses?  He told me he could have sworn that I had glasses on in the audition (which I didn’t) and that is why he cast me!!!  Another time I got cast in an advert because the Director liked the way I fell backwards … it’s such a peculiar business.   

Andrew, my husband, has asked me to help him write about our experience of colon cancer. Therefore, I am currently in the process of trying to remember and write the bare bones of my experience and feelings in regards to his colon cancer. Andrew, was sedated a great deal of the time post op, to reduce the pain threshold, so he has asked me to fill in the gaps …. we hope to put these accounts both his and mine into a book .. so watch this space.

Well it seems that the BBC have finally decided to axe Grange Hill after 30 years because they feel it doesn’t reflect the social realism of children’s lives today. This is a pity as it helped me to remember how old I am … I was in Grange Hill when I was 12 and was in the programme at the very beginning with Tucker and Trisha. If social realism is what they are aiming for then the BBC should look at all of their programmes … the axe may come down more than once!!

Update: There is a Facebook group aiming to save the show.