Huddersfield nurse: ‘I’d rather quit than drive waste around’

Oct 10 2009 by Sam Casey, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

Huddersfield nurse: ‘I’d rather quit than drive waste around’

AN EXPERIENCED nurse quit her job in anger after she was ordered to carry used swabs and bandages in her own car.

Rosemary Robinson, 53, spent 11 years as a district nurse, treating patients in their own homes in and around Huddersfield.

But she resigned after her employer, Kirklees Community Healthcare Services, which is part of the NHS Kirklees health trust, told all district nurses they would have to transport clinical waste themselves.

Mrs Robinson, of Long Lane in Honley, said: “I told them I would resign rather than carry clinical waste in my car because, whatever they say, it’s a risk.

“I felt so passionately about it, I couldn’t not resign.”

Clinical waste is waste produced directly from healthcare and is defined as items which may be hazardous and could cause infection.

It includes swabs, dressings and pharmaceutical products.

In the past, waste was bagged up in the patient’s home and collected by an authorised disposal service, working under contract for the NHS.

But the policy had to change because of the 2005 Hazardous Waste Regulations.

The regulations mean whoever produces the waste is responsible for managing it.

Mrs Robinson said the Government gave health trusts the option of employing a private contractor or having their own staff carry waste.

From June, sealed boxes were issued to Kirklees district nurses to put waste in.

But Mrs Robinson, whose main area of work was Marsden, said they were “totally inadequate.”

She added: “Can you imagine the stench in summer?

“The policy hasn’t been thought through properly, firstly by the Government and then by the trust.

“They don’t ask, they just push these policies on the people on the ground.

“I’m so demoralised by the situation and the people in Marsden were 100% behind me.”