Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

The Trial of Lucy Letby

I have spoken to quite a few people over the years about whistleblowing culture in the NHS...suffice it to say that you have to be VERY brave indeed to go outside the chain of command - the system has ways of making your life very miserable indeed.

Whatever motivated Letby to do this, she was aided and abetted by a ranks-closing culture of secrecy and denial which pervades many parts of the NHS.
Yeah, I find it depressingly easy to understand how the doctors and other nurses kept their complaints within the Trust. It's the psychology of organisations, fear of becoming exposed, lots of stuff. In fact 'someone could have been saved if they'd only made their move earlier' is pretty much a constant in these cases. The only thing I don't get about the consultants is around their high status and even natural arrogance - it's a trivial part of the damage Letby was doing, but she was actively undoing their good (lifesaving) work. I'd have thought one or two of the consultants might have pushed a bit harder or gone outside the Trust on almost self interested grounds. Having said all that, it's not about blaming docs and other nurses, it's about encouraging whistle blowing. It saves lives.
 
I have spoken to quite a few people over the years about whistleblowing culture in the NHS...suffice it to say that you have to be VERY brave indeed to go outside the chain of command - the system has ways of making your life very miserable indeed.

Whatever motivated Letby to do this, she was aided and abetted by a ranks-closing culture of secrecy and denial which pervades many parts of the NHS.

It seems to rarely be clinical staff and more commonly trust executives and high level management. There's been some shocking cases of doctors being reported to the GMC with fabricated or exaggerated accusations to try and shut them up.
 
Yeah, I find it depressingly easy to understand how the doctors and other nurses kept their complaints within the Trust. It's the psychology of organisations, fear of becoming exposed, lots of stuff. In fact 'someone could have been saved if they'd only made their move earlier' is pretty much a constant in these cases. The only thing I don't get about the consultants is around their high status and even natural arrogance - it's a trivial part of the damage Letby was doing, but she was actively undoing their good (lifesaving) work. I'd have thought one or two of the consultants might have pushed a bit harder or gone outside the Trust on almost self interested grounds. Having said all that, it's not about blaming docs and other nurses, it's about encouraging whistle blowing. It saves lives.
I think that part of this is a hostile management culture towards clinical staff, which, alongside the massive pressure they are kept under, is creating a kind of siege mentality, which would make different clinicians be very reluctant to dob their coalface colleagues in to the people in suits upstairs. Which, coupled with the likely reaction, or complete inaction, of said suits upstairs, leaves them only the option of "failing to notice" what's going on.

It is amazing what we can ignore when we don't know what to do about it, or if the consequences of doing something about it are too unpalatable to contemplate.

ETA:: tldr; snap, LDC :)
 
I agree. It ends up being a circular argument - they did the evil thing because they are an evil person.

I'm not some bleeding heart liberal who wants to find excuses for what people have done. But I think it is important for us as a species to try and figure out what produces these people and their disgusting acts.
Yep. If we see some people as "monsters" it makes it harder to do that. I think there's a tendency to paint them as such to distance ourselves from them, but it's humans that do these horrible things and we need to deal with that if we're ever going to understand why.
 
I’m coming round to her actually being guilty now I’ve read more. This is interesting.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_4969.png
    IMG_4969.png
    259.3 KB · Views: 155
I think that part of this is a hostile management culture towards clinical staff, which, alongside the massive pressure they are kept under, is creating a kind of siege mentality, which would make different clinicians be very reluctant to dob their coalface colleagues in to the people in suits upstairs. Which, coupled with the likely reaction, or complete inaction, of said suits upstairs, leaves them only the option of "failing to notice" what's going on.

It is amazing what we can ignore when we don't know what to do about it, or if the consequences of doing something about it are too unpalatable to contemplate.

ETA:: tldr; snap, LDC :)
Absolutely an aspect of NHS managerialism and the rise of powerful managers. Gagging orders and the rest are all in the mix when people see something is wrong and end up leaving themselves. Though equally, I don't know if there was ever a golden age of NHS whistle blowing (as in I really don't know).
 
Is that emerging? Where is it emerging from?

Letby wanted the attention of an anonymous doctor​

The prosecution claimed Letby was having a secret relationship with a married doctor, who worked at the Countess of Chester hospital and cannot be named for legal reasons, though the nurse repeatedly denied this.

Texts shown to the court revealed the pair messaged regularly, swapping love heart emojis, and met up several times outside work – including on a day trip to London – even after Letby was removed from the neonatal unit in July 2016.

The nature of their relationship was said to be significant: he was one of the doctors who would be called when babies suddenly deteriorated. She harmed them, it was suggested, to get his “personal attention”. Letby denied this.
 
I think one thing likely will happen because of this: 24H surveillance in premature babies' wards?

I think that is already the norm. I've only been to two PICUs and NICUs but they both had 24-hour CCTV. It's for other reasons than protecting against wrongdoers, though.
 
In terms of her clinical colleagues there will at least be some who will have dampened any suspicions they had, not to close ranks but because the idea would be so abhorrent there would be huge “does not compute” cognitive dissonance. I reckon more so among colleagues who have entered the job to fundamentally care for others. :(

The ripples are going to be felt much wider than the lives she’s directly affected. It’s going to hang over NICU care across the whole country. It is literally a parent’s worst nightmare.
 
I have spoken to quite a few people over the years about whistleblowing culture in the NHS...suffice it to say that you have to be VERY brave indeed to go outside the chain of command - the system has ways of making your life very miserable indeed.

Whatever motivated Letby to do this, she was aided and abetted by a ranks-closing culture of secrecy and denial which pervades many parts of the NHS.

A lot of people here may be familiar with this case, but what really brought it home to me how dangerous it was was reading the account in Private Eye of a senior consultant getting a death threat (that he "would end up like Dr Kelly in the woods with his wrists slit" as I recall) if he didn't stop raising as a problem an issue with ventilation in an operating theatre.
 
Panorama at 8 pm. Some grim stuff about the Trust, including threats to the docs, will be covered. Turns out letby won a grievance against the consultants, who had to apologise to her. On bbc news, just now.

I was watching some of it on the news earlier but had to switch it off. It's too much to stomach and I won't be watching this either. I could end up " sex pistoling" my TV.
 
I was watching some of it on the news earlier but had to switch it off. It's too much to stomach and I won't be watching this either. I could end up " sex pistoling" my TV.

I watched that too. Her childhood best friend in complete denial saying she was 'the sweetest person you could ever meet and there's no way she could do this'. I don't think I'd be putting my face on TV sayin that..
 
I watched that too. Her childhood best friend in complete denial saying she was 'the sweetest person you could ever meet and there's no way she could do this'. I don't think I'd be putting my face on TV sayin that..

Aren't they always. The West's neighbours for example coming out and saying that they were perfect neighbours or some bollocks like that.
 
I watched that too. Her childhood best friend in complete denial saying she was 'the sweetest person you could ever meet and there's no way she could do this'. I don't think I'd be putting my face on TV sayin that..
I don't know - the friend is probably in utter shock. There are other friends from university who've said that she was a quiet, sweet, kind person and they can't believe what's happened.
 
Edit: Actually can't be bothered.
I’m not sure we should be slating anyone (at least someone completely unrelated to the case) for taking time to come around to the idea that she intentionally murdered babies, particularly before there’s a suggestion of a possible motive. It’s a pretty horrific thing to get one’s head around. :(
 
Not surprised there was no thread, absolutely no idea what this is about now let alone then.
 
Honestly fuck right off with your posts on this, you're posting erratic spurious bollocks based on shit people gossip to you or post on social media ffs.

If you ever get selected for jury service excuse yourself as not fit.
No. I’m entitled to my opinion and I’m entitled to change it. And I’ve been on jury service. Slightly baffled by your aggression but I sometimes forget what this place can be like. 🤷‍♀️
 
I’m not sure we should be slating anyone (at least someone completely unrelated to the case) for taking time to come around to the idea that she intentionally murdered babies, particularly before there’s a suggestion of a possible motive. It’s a pretty horrific thing to get one’s head around. :(
My point was more about the A level psychologist students hot take on the person's mental health. Anyway that's why I edited it.
 
I can’t bend my head round it. West and Hindley were accomplices of men who may not have become serial killers without that. The closest she is to is Allitt, who operated in a similar manner but was considered odd rather than leaving folk in disbelief.

TBF in her case there are so many layers of social conditioning - how she looks, what her job is (especially), what her name is - that I am not surprised that people cannot comprehend that she did this.
 
Back
Top Bottom