Blood Glucose Monitoring At Work

[tracey w]

I cant believe companies are still like this.
I am very lucky where I work, Any time for Hospitals is granted and paid.
Any new gizmo like test meters and including my pump is always greeted with questions and interest.
And that includes from the top man in the company.

Wow, they sound great employers,

apart from the 6 days hol i have just had, i have used the rest of my hol entitlement on hospital and doctors appointmments.

the other week i was 20 mins late due to hypo and therefore could not drive for 45mins, i was asked if i had time owing or did i need to work extra??😱

 

[katie]

Wow, they sound great employers,

apart from the 6 days hol i have just had, i have used the rest of my hol entitlement on hospital and doctors appointmments.

the other week i was 20 mins late due to hypo and therefore could not drive for 45mins, i was asked if i had time owing or did i need to work extra??😱

😱

I used to have a horrible boss, but I worked at a college that had a lot of disabled children so they were big on 'equality and diversity'. Whenever I said I had a hospital appointment there were no questions asked, I just went during paid hours. I always assumed that companies had to allow this?! Why should you take hospital appointments as holiday when you didnt choose to have diabetes?

I cant believe the OPs situation. I think I would ignore them and carry on 😱

 

[shiv]

oh i currently work for RBS and had to take holiday for hospital appointments. apparently it's outside policy guidelines to let me go to the hospital on their time.

 

[bev]

My son is 11 and is allowed to test at his desk in the classroom. He was also allowed to do this at primary school. Schools have no legal requirement to 'look after' diabetic children in the school environment (they just have a 'duty of care')- but even schools recognise that its much safer for a child who is hypo to sit still and test. The idea of anyone being blood sensitive or needle sensitive has never arisen and these are children under the age of 11.

If your workplace cant offer you a clean private room to do whats required - then they should let you test at your desk. I would never want my son to test or inject in a toilet! Would you eat your food in a toilet? NO. So why is it hygienic enough to draw blood and inject? Needles are sterile for a reason.😱

If an asthmatic needed to use an inhaler at the desk - would he be allowed to? Would they make him walk to the toilet whilst he cant breathe? Just because you cant 'see' the effects of diabetes doesnt mean its not there! Would they prefer you to be locked in the toilet having a bad hypo unable to get out?

I wonder if this comes under the DDA?🙂Bev

 

[aymes]

That does seem so bizarre, I can think of no health and safety risk which would mean you need to go elsewhere to do tests and actually think there are several potential risks I could identify with having to go elsewhere! I'd be interested to know what grounds they see it as a problem on, they really should explain themselves and that would give you the opportunity to challenge. It may be worthwhile chatting to your DSN to see if they will back you up in challenging them. Maybe come up with plenty of reasons why testing in the toilets would be a worse idea, you might scare them that they'd be more liable if there's a problem and they've made you do that...!

 

[tracey w]

oh i currently work for RBS and had to take holiday for hospital appointments. apparently it's outside policy guidelines to let me go to the hospital on their time.

Yes, officially they dont have to let you go in their time and be paid, its just nice if they do, unfortunately my boss although very understanding with the diabetes is a stickler for company rules and everything has to be in my own time. Problem is i dont have any left now, and no more hols until MARCH 😱

OH said i will just have to go sick if i need any more time, unfortunately this is what i will have to do, but its not right is it?

 

[velcrohead]

Wow, they sound great employers,

apart from the 6 days hol i have just had, i have used the rest of my hol entitlement on hospital and doctors appointmments.

the other week i was 20 mins late due to hypo and therefore could not drive for 45mins, i was asked if i had time owing or did i need to work extra??😱

They are not bad Tracey, I still have 3 weeks and half a day of holiday to use by the end of January, I might take an extended Christmas break and take advantage of the bank holidays to 'extend' it a bit.
We dont get paid for Doctors appointments anymore, but we run a flexitime scheme where we can make hours up, and even add an extra 12 days holiday entitlement if we want, We can have 1 day off flexi per month.

 

[tracey w]

They are not bad Tracey, I still have 3 weeks and half a day of holiday to use by the end of January, I might take an extended Christmas break and take advantage of the bank holidays to 'extend' it a bit.
We dont get paid for Doctors appointments anymore, but we run a flexitime scheme where we can make hours up, and even add an extra 12 days holiday entitlement if we want, We can have 1 day off flexi per month.

Have they got any jobs??

 

[velcrohead]

Have they got any jobs??

Ha ha, Not at the moment unfortunately.

 

[falcon123]

Hi, I had a phone call from the nurse I spoke to yesterday evening and she thinks she may have found some useful information for. If it is of use I will post it here.

Over the years I have found employers attitudes extremely variable. Securing my first proper job was quite difficult as there was a lot of ignorance and prejudice at that time. I resigned after 18 months as my salary was very low and the promised training never came. In both this job and temporary ones either side I had no problems about my diabetes or issues about attending clinics in working hours. I then had a lot of difficulty in finding anther job. Both my (late) parents worked for large organisations and were both dismayed when I was rejected following medicals with them. I know my mother went to see the head of personnel and gave him quite an ear bashing about being ignorant, not recognising people with ability, etc. Eventually I secured a job with a large company. They were large enough to have their own medical centre which had a nurse on duty during normal working hours and a part-time doctor. The older nurse saw it as her job to take care of the health of all staff. Prior to self monitoring she would carry out urine tests. She also checked BP?s for any staff on medication, syringed ears, etc. No manager would dare question her actions ? a dragon with a heart of pure gold. Again time off for clinics, etc. was never an issue. The only problem I ever had was in my last three months (under notice of redundancy) when a new manager felt I could work highly irregular shift patterns whereas I requested a more regular pattern. He spoke to a doctor about it who told him it was fine for insulin dependant diabetics to work highly irregular hours. I took advice and after threatening to report the doctor (who knew nothing specific about my case) to the BMA the issue was dropped and I worked a regular pattern. The next job again was problem free for the first few years. A new manager, who had been head hunted, then arrived. It started with requests to change my clinic appointments as it was not convenient. At times policies were quite inconsistent but as this post is getting rather over long I will not waste time on them, suffice to say it was easier to go to your child?s school in working hours than attend anything else. PC madness. My latest job has followed much the same pattern. Initially absolutely no problems over clinic appointments, etc. A new manager then decided I should take annual leave for them. Eventually a compromise was reached and they count as sick leave. Because of the location of work and the hospital I sometimes take annual leave to avoid having to run around like the proverbial? The round trip is about 70 miles. Odd issues do crop up of which the blood testing is the latest!

The prejudices that existed when I first started work did disappear after a few years. However, I feel many are returning just they are underground or disguised as a ?H&S? or similar measure!