Visitor cards
The hospitals that form part of the Carlos Haya complex now have new regulations limiting visitor numbers
24.02.11 - 11:13 -
Regulations. Carlos Haya hospital representatives announced the new rules for visitors earlier this week. Carlos Moret
The scene of a huge crowd of relatives and friends surrounding a hospital bed looks set to become a thing of the past in the three hospitals that make up Malaga’s Carlos Haya complex: Carlos Haya, Hospital Civil and Hospital Materno-Infantil. The management have drawn up a new set of rules aimed at protecting the privacy of the patient as well as guaranteeing the peace and quiet their recovery requires.
According to the hospital’s own calculations every day a total of 12,000 people go through the hospitals’ doors, including staff, patients and visitors. Surveys carried out among patients have revealed that comfort during their stay is the aspect they rate the lowest, and most complain of the large numbers of visitors invading the wards. Now the hospital management has decided to do something about this lack of control and has drawn up a new set of regulations. From this week the public are only able to access the wards between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. and only two visitors are allowed per patient at any one time.
Outside these official visiting times the patient may only be accompanied by their carer, who will still be able to remain at their bedside 24 hours a day. Carers are issued with an access card with a bar code that enables them to open the automatic doors that lead to the hospitalisation wards.
Visitor cards
During the official visiting hours the carer may give their card to another person and a second card will be issued for a visitor, but no patient is allowed more than two visitors, including the holder of the carer’s card, at any one time. Changeovers will have to be carried out in the hospital foyer. Children under the age of 12 are not allowed onto the wards except in special circumstances.
“These new regulations have been established with the consensus of all the parties involved”, explained the managing director, Antonio Pérez Rielo, who explained that representatives of associations of patients, consumers, volunteers and hospital professionals had been consulted.
Pérez Rielo admitted that recently there had been no control over visiting hours or numbers of visitors, and that this had had a negative effect on the patients’ well-being.
With the old system there were times when patients had to share the reduced space in their wards with as many as ten other people. One of the hospital’s nurses, Francisca Arenas, stressed that studies prove that many postoperative patients require more painkillers and sedatives after visits. “They overexert themselves to attend to their visitors and this takes its toll”, she stresses.
Flexibility
The new rules do not apply to the Accident and Emergency department, Intensive Care and the Neonatal ward as these have their own regulations. They also allow a certain amount of flexibility in special cases, for example, if death is expected to be imminent.
Hospital users and visitors have praised the new rules. Most admitted to being guilty of forming part of large family groups around hospital beds, but are in favour of the restrictions.
“Sometimes we want to be at a patient’s side in hospital and we don’t think that we might be making things worse, because what they really need is to rest and that’s impossible with so many people in the room”, said one relative earlier this week. “I think it’s a fantastic measure. Since we are unable to limit ourselves then the hospital must impose its controls”, she added. “I wouldn’t like to be in a bed with so many people standing around me”, admitted another relative who also praised the regulations.
In fact all of the visitors consulted outside the Carlos Haya hospital on Monday said they were happy with the new rules, and needless to say doctors’ and nurses’ associations are also satisfied. The only doubt came from the patients’ association who fear that concentrating all the visits into just four hours a day could be counterproductive. “We’ve tried that timetable before and it hasn’t worked” said a representative.
Collaboration
The hospital has called for collaboration and has promised to enforce the regulations, calling on the services of security guards if necessary. Other hospitals, such as the Costa del Sol or the Clínico (Virgen de la Victoria), have their own visiting regulations although these may not always be enforced.
