Vote for your NHS:

First thing first: 19 years in the NHS this month; I deserve a medal ;)

In Nov 2000 I started on East ward, Kent & Canterbury hospital, I loved the place. But I remember vividly the newspaper cut-out hanging in the staff room/ doctors’ office: a Daily Mail article labelling the K&C hospital as a third world hospital. The staff were all upset and demoralised by the concept that they were failing the patients.

Nurses care. That’s not what we do, that’s who we are, we care. And when caring is not satisfactory we feel we are responsible, we feel that we are failing our patients. We know it is the system, funding and politics, but it is not the prime minister who is running between those patients lying on trollies in the corridor, it is us. When things go bad, we feel the pain, the suffering of our patients, the suffering of our colleagues, our suffering. This is how my wonderful friends in K&C hospital felt, they did not need the hate-filled Daily Mail article to tell them patients are suffering, they lived that.

Gradually things have changed. I was a sign of that change, oversees nurses, more staff, more funding, more services, more support. Years passed and what once was the norm: patients in A&E on trollies waiting for beds for days, has since became a taboo.

 2010 brought us David Cameron who said that his priorities can be put in three letters: NHS.

Nine years have passed, the news stories we used to see and hear in 2000 are back on our screens, and for the unlucky ones, in our wards and units, in our lives. The long waits, for appointments, operations, and  A&E visits and admissions, it is all back.

I have been on many nights were  at midnight we had >100 patients in A&E, people lying on the floor, waiting for very long hours. Bad nights, more bad nights and days, and weeks, and you can do nothing, you feel helpless.

This is the dilemma that all NHS face, you want to care, but to do so you need time, resources and support. You do not get these things and you feel that you are failing your patients, those in your care, it becomes personal. All the while those who are high office and responsible of depriving you from time, resources and support are posting how much they care about the NHS, about you and what you do.

I love my job, I am proud of my profession but seeing the misery in our NHS, the future that is being created everyday over the past 9 years, makes me think everyday if I want to remain in this job.

People do not remember, because only those who suffer have the memory, so my advice after 19 years in the NHS:. The Tories do not care about the NHS, never did, never will, and if you do not remember, do not risk it, because you will never forget.

Ahmad Baker