manky
I once covered a nursing shift at a ward I hadn't worked on before. I was looking after an oldish man who'd had a stroke and who could no longer talk or move himself around much. I'd been told he could still eat and drink so I went to take him some food and help him to eat it. He looked at me with worried eyes as I brought a spoonful of food up to his mouth and didn't seem to want to take it. I noticed a really horrible smell from his mouth so I gloved up and had a look inside with a torch. What I saw (and smelt) will never be erased from my memory. His mouth was full of rotting food that had obviously been there for days. It had turned to grey sludge like you might find in your drain if you haven't cleaned it for a couple of years. Stuck in the sludge was the odd bit of carrot and vegetables from more recent meals. People had obviously been shoveling food into his mouth but not bothering to check if he was actually swallowing the food and not bothering to clean his mouth every day. I cleaned out his mouth immediately and I had to pull out chunks of this grey jellyish yuck from his cheeks, from his gums and from behind his teeth. The smell was unbelievable and I've never been so close to puking at work before or since. The poor man had been sat with that stuff caked in his mouth probably for days or even weeks. No wonder his eyes looked worried. I reported the incident and the ward was shut down not long afterwards (not just because of this incident - there'd been a whole string of similar things).
(Mary Mandolin still had it on, Fri 22 Jun 2007, 13:39, Reply)