Northerner
Admin (Retired)
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Obese patients take up extra bed spaces in hospital, require more staff to treat them and need an array of super-strength equipment to withstand their weight as part of their growing burden on the NHS, physiotherapists have said.
Other patients can miss out on treatment because those who are dangerously overweight need two physiotherapists for their session, while fewer beds have been fitted into some wards because obese patients use bigger ones.
"These patients in general take more than one therapist to treat, require more expensive equipment to treat, and the time trying to locate equipment increases the treatment time", one physiotherapist told a survey conducted by the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy.
Very heavy patients also use more NHS resources by staying in hospital for longer, though that can be because of delays in obtaining specialist equipment to help them cope when they get home after discharge, the physiotherapist added.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/feb/19/nhs-cope-obese-patients
Other patients can miss out on treatment because those who are dangerously overweight need two physiotherapists for their session, while fewer beds have been fitted into some wards because obese patients use bigger ones.
"These patients in general take more than one therapist to treat, require more expensive equipment to treat, and the time trying to locate equipment increases the treatment time", one physiotherapist told a survey conducted by the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy.
Very heavy patients also use more NHS resources by staying in hospital for longer, though that can be because of delays in obtaining specialist equipment to help them cope when they get home after discharge, the physiotherapist added.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/feb/19/nhs-cope-obese-patients