Don't be confused. Everyone is entitled to a - word escapes me, not companion - so when the Nurse was in and out of the office for equipment etc., I was asked to keep the patient calm whilst the Consultant prepared the kit. What's wrong with that? No one in all those years ever complained or asked me to leave and I was thanked many times for holding hands - usually men
.
We didn't have any infections due to the intense nature of the cleaning processes, limited visiting times and everyone working in their Dept./Wards - people didn't move around as much as they seem to do in the NHS these days as they were directly employed, not via an Agency. I don't remember gloves being worn except in Theatre. Drugs were checked 3 times B4 being given/injected. Against the drug chart, against the patient's name tag, with another Nurse. No outbreaks of MRSA etc. in those days. AH! Chaperone AH!......... and in all the Hospitals I worked at across the UK it was the same in the 1960s/70s/80s ........ secretaries went into the clinics to take notes in shorthand ......... interacting with the patients who weren't a number but a person. We often had to explain procedures etc. after the Drs had gone onto the next patient as we weren't as - again word escapes me
- but we were approachable I suppose.
I was in another country but not abroad ;-)
