In need of a severe RANT!

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AkiraLe
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat Mar 03, 2018 7:45 am

In need of a severe RANT!

Post by AkiraLe »

Depressed, why bother ---- RANT!

Well I've just written 1 entry & lost it so I shall try to write again!
Dialysis is really getting on my nerves right now, well it's not so much the dialysis as the environment. The other patients are fine, but its the lack of light, the poor service from Fresenius and all the stupid little errors, blitzes & mistakes that have built up over the past 13 weeks I've been there.. Things are that bad that i've booked in with the counsellor.
My normal unit, has plenty of light, & even a little flower bed which I helped create with one of the nurses, that has a bench for sitting on. I miss that, little difference.
I probably need another holiday, & you would thing I could go to somewhere in this country.. No chance unless I just wait till next year. The crisis is a pain in the ass. I don't even get a proper clinic appointment. Just a doctor coming round & discussing things in front of the other patients!

It's getting to the stage where I wake up in the morning & think.. Oh Shit! It's dialysis. I know I should be useing it, rather than letting it use me but it's the inflexibility. Some mornings I wake up & wish I hadn't!
I'm not even on call for a tx, but a 4th I really need to have some proper support for making the decision, which I ain't got! No ones sat down & updated me on the latest technology. Do I always have to hold the doctors hand!!

Just had to get all that off my nerves!! Thanks for listening.
I'll probably feel better for it for posting & tomorrow!
Last edited by AkiraLe on Thu Mar 08, 2018 10:30 am, edited 4 times in total.
wagolynn
Posts: 1362
Joined: Thu May 23, 2013 2:49 pm

Re: In need of a severe RANT!

Post by wagolynn »

Hi AkiraLe,

I also dialyse at a Fresenius unit, and recognizances some of your gripes.

But I think in the end it is all part of modern life, it all appears to be, 'never mind the quality feel the width', everything nearly doe's what it should.
I think part of the problem is the nurses are permanently on the unit, and therefore it degenerates in to a never ending routine for them.

I see the consultant about for times a year at a clinic, we see a trainee doctor (they try their hand at renal for three months) roughly once a month.
The dietician comes around monthly, and is also at the clinic.

It is apparent that due to the unit being contracted out, many things fall between the cracks.
Just one example, needles, to minimise the number of items in stock, only one length of needle is bought in each bore size, using a needle that is too long is the main cause of blow outs. Blow outs are never recorded, so no one can look at the history, and pinpoint the cause.

Is the lighting problem due to other patients wanting to watch TV ?

My children bought me a Kindle which has made reading much easier, and I don't care about the lights anymore.

My other defence is to try and learn as much as I can about my condition, and it's treatment, and use this to make sure I am getting the correct treatment.
I ask questions, look out for, 'waffle', answers though, read on the subject, and some research on the internet, if you try this take trouble to check the source because there is some wild rubbish out there on the web.

All I can say to you, is don't take it personally, I think everyone on dialysis will have a list of niggles.

Best wishes.
JMan
Posts: 3470
Joined: Fri Apr 23, 2004 10:21 am
Location: Lives in a slightly weird bit of Shropshire called Telford!

Re: In need of a severe RANT!

Post by JMan »

Your post reads very very much like my experience of a Fresenius dialysis unit.

I'd ask where it is ,(but feel free to PM me your response).

I was in a newish, unit in London, and also helped make up a small flowerbed with one of the staff and family. A little bench, nice to wait for transport in the summer.


Then I was shunted to a lightless, airless Fresenius unit with a manager who bullied staff, turned off the lights, didn't manage the stock (literally patients would turn up and there'd be some stock missing!

Fresenius also have the insolence to request you sign a consent form to be treated.. Sounds like they are breaching their shiny 'mission statement' or whatever it is they have pinned up their units.

I have to say I took a drastic action one morning when I walked in and found another patient in the waiting room, he'd been 'refused treatment for being rude to the manager' (he actually later took her to court). I flipped, walked straight out and called my consultant directly..

I wasn't refusing treatment, I was refusing to be treated in an inhumane, unsafe manner. And yes it really badly affected my mental health as well.

So good luck, whatever your decision for the future.


To finish, I know there are good Fres units, with decent staff.. But as a large private for profit company they put shareholders and profit before service and patients, and will of course deny that! With Fresnius the customer sometimes comes last..
"Dialysis! What is this? The dark ages!"
L. 'Bones' McCoy, ST"
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