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74
Incontinence pads service
The issue of incontinence pads, which are of great assistance in
the nursing of incontinent persons in their own homes continues
and 132,000 pads were issued during the year. In addition, 46,400
interliners were issued for use in special protective pants provided
by the Council. Protective pants and interliners are of particular
value to ambulant patients, including subnormal and handicapped
children. Most households make their own arrangements for disposal
of incontinence pads and interliners, but in some cases
it is necessary to arrange collection and disposal by incineration.
Home dialysis
When, because of illness or other reason, a person's kidneys
fail to carry out their task of eradicating waste products from the
blood, the result normally is death from a condition known as
uraemia. In such cases of kidney damage, however, it is now
possible to alleviate the effects of the malfunction of the kidneys by
renal dialysis, namely, the extracorporeal circulation of the blood
through a special machine known as a dialysis unit or " artificial
kidney ". In the early days of renal dialysis, this treatment was
carried out only in hospital under medical and nursing supervision,
but dialysis units have been developed, which, with appropriate
training, the patient can use at home, and there is an increasing
tendency to discharge patients from hospital and provide the
dialysis at home. Whilst this has the advantage of releasing much
needed hospital beds and obviates the necessity for the patient to
travel to and from hospital for dialysis, and, of course, remain
in the hospital while the treatment is carried out, it nevertheless
does mean that special arrangements must be made at the patient's
home for this treatment.
Wherever possible, patients are trained to be totally independent
in undertaking the whole of the dialysing procedures. In circumstances
where this is not possible and patients require help with
dialysing and/or the " building " of the artificial kidney, assistance
is provided by those members of the home nursing service who
have been specially trained to undertake these procedures.
To enable a patient to undertake home dialysis, it is necessary
that the dialysis unit be installed in a specially adapted room set
aside for this purpose. The walls and floor of the room should
be covered with some impervious material, so that they may be
easily washed down, and a sink with hot and cold water supplies,
a water softener and certain standard and special electrical sockets
are needed, among other things. Whilst it is accepted that the
provision of the actual machine is the responsiblity of the hospital
concerned, the adaptations to the room necessary to the installation
of the machine are regarded as the responsibility of the local
health authority for the area where the patient resides.