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Reasons for admission :
Emergency admissions
Planned admissions

In the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) :
Seeing the patient in ICU for the first time
Suspending normal routines: visiting ICU every day
Uncertainty
Emotional impact on relatives & friends in ICU
Impact on children
Telling others
Relationships within and between families
Receiving information and news from doctors
Sources of information in ICU
Nursing care
Keeping a diary
Sources of support in ICU
At the bedside:
- Waiting for news
- Signs of improvement and progress
The relatives' room and overnight accommodation:
- The relatives' room
- Overnight accommodation

When someone dies :
End of life decisions
Death and bereavement:

On a general ward :
The ward environment and nursing care
Hospital discharge and rehabilitation

Life after leaving the hospital :
Supporting and caring for the ill person at home
Impact on work and finances
Attitudes to life after the hospital experience
Messages to others
Emotional impact on relatives and carers
- Emotional impact on family and friends
- Adjusting to a changed life
Support and information
- Support and information
- Lack of support and information

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Intensive care: experiences of family & friends

People's stories

Aged 61-70

Interview 27

Interview 27

Age at Interview: 66
Sex: Female
Background: Retired teacher, married with three adult children. Ethnic background/nationality: White British.

Brief outline:Her husband had cardiac arrest and was admitted to ICU. She is his full-time carer and worries about leaving him on his own because of his memory.

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Her husband was improving but became dehydrated and developed a kidney infection, which set him back again.
Print During a lot of this time [my husband] was very agitated and not deliberately but he seemed to pull out his canulas because he kept, he'd thrashed his arms around a little bit and his favourite way of lying in bed was actually lying sideways with his legs over the side of the cot. And, you know, the canulas kept coming out with the result that then they left the canula out and [my husband] was receiving very, very little fluid. He actually contracted kidney problems, although my daughter who is actually now, she's one of community matrons locally, she pointed out that he really was showing the clinical signs of dehydration but they kept saying, “Oh we'll wait for the blood test”. With the result that when the blood test came through, the results came through, [my husband] had you know quite a bad kidney infection. And he went on antibiotics for that and had a very bad reaction to that. He came up in a rash, got the most horrendous diarrhoea and he was just tearing himself because of the itch. And this happened like coming up to a weekend when there was really very few doctors available and in the end just one of the nurses took very kindly, she actually sent down to the children's ward to get some calamine lotion for him.

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