DR MAX THE MIND DOCTOR: Amid the gloom I see the human spirit at its best in hospitals at Christmas
Two very different Christmases take place in hospitals. First, there is the one on children’s wards. Despite the awfulness of being ill at what is, especially for youngsters, such an exciting time of year, everything is done to maintain traditions.
There is carol singing and parties, people pull crackers and give out presents. Families crowd round beds, taking their celebrations from home to the ward.
In fact, the mood is often so jolly that some children who have been sent home for the festive period actually return on Christmas Day to join in the party.
Christmas in hospitals: Despite the awfulness of being ill at what is, especially for youngsters, such an exciting time of year, everything is done to maintain traditions (file picture)
This is a wonderful testament to the staff.
When I worked on a children’s cancer ward a few years ago, the weeks around Christmas seemed to be a marathon party. Local celebrities would drop in, apparently unannounced (although I suspect the matron always knew in advance, as she seemed to appear in full make-up and heels on any day a hunky actor made a ‘surprise appearance’).
Of course, children still had to have unpleasant chemotherapy or painful radiotherapy. But for a while, everything seemed a little bit better.
Elsewhere in our health service, things are rather different.
In the lead-up to Christmas on adult wards, as many patients as possible are discharged. But some are too ill to go home or have nowhere to go.
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Here, the atmosphere is sombre.
On dementia wards in particular, people linger, not even fully aware of the time of year, often with no visitors and no presents. They are served ready-prepared, vacuum-packed Christmas dinners and the staff are eager to get home to their families as quickly as possible.
I’m afraid things have changed for the worse over recent years.
It wasn’t always this bleak. Not that long ago, it was a tradition for doctors to come in on Christmas Day and serve dinner to patients on all the wards.
In those days the consultant was still considered God, so having him (and, yes, they were usually men) don an apron and paper hat and hand out turkey dinners, surrounded by junior staff, was a significant event for patients.
Indeed, it seemed symbolic of the Christmas message: that this was a time for goodwill and humility. But as healthcare has become more corporate and with the introduction of rigid staff shift patterns, this tradition has been lost.
Sadly, few senior staff now consider giving up a day’s holiday in such a way. I’m afraid this is just another example of our increasingly fragmented and self-centred society.
Yet despite this trend, every year on the dementia ward where I work, something special still happens to remind us of the true meaning of Christmas.
Tomorrow, as he has done every year for well over 20 years, the ward consultant, Dr Webber, sacrifices his own Christmas Day to go to the hospital.
Do you have a sweet tooth and worry that too much refined sugar is affecting your health? If so, have you promised yourself not to over-indulge in puddings over the coming days?
Such concerns might seem unjustified if you read this week that a reputable journal, Annals of Internal Medicine, has published research which found current government advice on sugar consumption to be over-cautious.
I don’t want to be a killjoy — but you should take that message with a pinch of … sugar.
Surely it’s no coincidence that the research was funded by Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Mars.
The patients on his ward are the type of people who have become most isolated in society and are easily forgotten.
But not by the remarkable Dr Webber. He buys and wraps a present for each patient, makes mince pies, organises games and spends hours on the ward ensuring that each patient has a proper Christmas.
W hat is particularly touching is that he does all this without fanfare.
If I wasn’t writing this column, only the patients and hospital staff would ever know about it.
Such behaviour is rare in our increasingly selfish world.
But it is worth reflecting on what we can learn from a man such as Dr Webber, and how his personal sacrifice sits alongside the story of Christmas.
That the Saviour of the world was born in lowly, humble conditions is central to the Christian message, but this fact can easily be forgotten amid the frivolity and materialism that dominates at this time of year.
I’m sure there are many others like Dr Webber.
This weekend, we should salute these remarkable people and their selfless actions as they prove that it is possible for everyone to experience the festive spirit.
Offer your friendship, the greatest gift of all
The latest TV adverts from the charity Age UK highlight the isolation that so many older people feel. I find it heartbreaking that there are an estimated 1.2 million elderly who feel chronically lonely. What a sad indictment of our society.
At this time of year, we often start to think about New Year resolutions. These tend to focus on positive changes we want to make and usually involve our physical health in some way — to give up smoking, lose weight or get fitter.
Yet what better resolution could any of us have than to befriend a lonely older person?
I did this for several years while at medical school and I found it incredibly rewarding.
In my first year as a student, a friend and I signed up to a befriending charity and were allocated to a very elderly woman, Mrs Bullen. She was a widow with no children and was entirely alone, her sister having died some years previously.
It soon transpired that she also had terminal cancer.
Looking back, I wonder what she made of two gangly, spotty 18-year-olds descending on her small flat once a week. We must have been quite a bore sometimes, as we moaned about our exams or what had happened in the student union the night before.
But she listened, gave sage advice, made us cups of tea and, at the end of our visits, would give us plastic bags crammed full of goodies to keep us going.
She was convinced we didn’t eat enough and tried to feed us up!
While we had started befriending with the intention of helping other people, in fact Mrs Bullen taught us much about life — and, indeed, death.
She was the first person I watched die and the matter-of-fact, stoic way in which she approached her diagnosis and demise was extraordinary to witness.
In fact, she had such a profound impact on my friend that he decided to become a specialist in medicine for older people. Today, nearly 20 years later, he is a consultant in community geriatrics.
And, of course, that is the real magic of befriending — it’s a two-way process.
What might start as an act of altruism rarely ends that way. The wonderful thing about the gift of friendship is that both the giver and the receiver get to share the present.
It’s good to talk but now, let’s act
This year, I’ve been surprised at how fashionable mental health has become.
It used to be a taboo subject, mentioned only in whispers, if at all. But it seems a cultural change has taken place, with everyone from celebrities to politicians talking openly about it.
Even the Royal Family has got behind the cause, with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge highlighting the issue of young people’s mental health.
This is all to the good, of course. But I’m afraid the increase in public awareness has not yet filtered through to the ground, and little has so far been achieved in improving the often dire state of the country’s mental health services.
This week, a Commons health select committee reported that one in three people who kill themselves have visited their GP in the days beforehand.
Of course, it can be difficult to identify when someone is suicidal unless they tell you.
Paradoxically, such people sometimes appear in good spirits, even elated, just before they kill themselves — which makes the danger hard to spot.
Significantly, MPs identified that too often there were delays in getting specialist help. Mental health services — especially those which respond to people thought to be at risk of suicide — are at breaking point.
This means vulnerable and at-risk patients are left with little or no support.
I know from the letters I receive from Mail readers that many of you have experienced this with loved ones, and are in despair over to what to do because, as things stand, the system simply can’t cope.
Please. After all the talk on this subject from politicians, we must have action.