Sunday, July 27, 2008

Done? Driving RNs Crazy for 5 years and Still Going

It has been quit a break in writting for me, but trust, I haven't been sitting back with my feet up. The supervisor of our department left for more money and less work at another hospital (poor bastard). So they promoted yours trully to run the department as well as emergency management for Maryland. So they locked me in a office and piled a bunch of paper work in front of me. They forgot how ever to take the radio away from me so when ever something pops up, I knock everything over and go to the fun.

In the past couple months we have had psychotic patients try to stab nurses in the face, throw computer screens at pregnant people, and of course I love my drunks who think it's a great idea to grope the RNs of the E.R. With my new title I at least get to address the issues with the CEO/President and all the Vice Presidents. Made some changes, but not enough to make it a safer place for the staff.

I have to wait for one of them to get hurt and they call a meeting and I say I told you so, now give me the money to un-screw this up (yes, I talk to them like this....when I know I am right). I never knew how boring paper work was, but it is important to make it a safer work environment.

This will probably be one of the last posts I will make. Paper work, legal suits, and ethics issues are not as interesting on paper. Yes, I know I will miss all the pissed nurses who leave angry comments (which I actually love reading) I have a lot on my plate. Between school, morgue attendant (bet you didn't know I did that too), being a active member of the Freemasons, York Rite, and work there is hardly time to write down my thoughts. I thank all those who have sent me supportive emails which I have needed at times.


Flashlight 1

Friday, January 25, 2008

New Post after a long Vacation


I thought I would write a new post. I have put my writing on the back burner for a while now. In the past several months you know a lot has happened at the hospital and I will go ahead and start writing new stories. Here is something from a recent incident;
I was sitting back watching our cameras when I received a call from the emergency room. The nurse told me that a hysterical women had just called. The women stated that her husband had pulled into the parking lot and started having a heart attack while on the phone with her. The nurse asked me if I could locate the vehicle, no problem at least I thought.

Well the man had driven up to the front of the E.R entrance. The door was ajar and he was hanging out the door. I called for help and of course no one came, read my stories there is a pattern here. I went to check his pulse and there was none, but his chest was going up and down. So for the hell of it I leaned his car seat back and started compressions while trying to call for help on my radio.




The nurses decided to send someone from registration to see why I kept yelling code blue. When the registration girl who has less training than me came out I got a pulse, faint, but it was there. I told the registration girl to get help (actually at this point I was cursing like a sailor). The triage nurse finally arrived to give a helping hand.

We got this large man out of his vehicle and onto a stretcher and an EMT came over to lend a hand. While we were moving him we managed to drop him on my left leg. They took over compressions because in the transfer his heart stopped again. We wheeled him into the emergency room where he was pronounced dead.

As I walked out of the emergency room slightly pissed off, lack of a better term, the new widow just came in and guess who got to play counselor next. So I took her to a private room and sat her down with the doctor. She was upset with the person that found her husband because when she hung up the phone he was alive. He had no history of heart attacks, lived healthy, and was rarely ever sick. I did not have the heart to tell her that person was me.



Flashlight 1

Friday, July 6, 2007

Time for a Break and a Secret Revealed

I have not been posting much at all lately as some of you have noticed. That being said I have decided to take a break from my blog. I am currently enrolled in college with criminal justice as my major and I am taking 15 credits. I have also become a Freemason and that has taken some of my time. There is a lot to learn and remember because Masons do not write anything down. The rest of my time I am working 48-56 hours a week at the hospital. I have little to no down time and free time is spent at my lodge, working, or doing school work. I appreciate everyone who reads my blog and those who take the time to leave comments.

I am not saying I am done for good with blogging, but I am very overwhelmed at the moment. There is one thing I have to say before I leave. I have to thank Mother Jones at Nurse Ratched's Place for getting me into blogging. If you go back and read mine and her blogs you may be able to figure out that we actually work in the same in hospital! I have worked with MJ for over a year now and she was the one who got me into blogging. Anyways thanks to all and I hope to be back soon. Please feel free to go back over the old stories and enjoy.
Flashlight 1

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

New Doctor on the Block

Well we have a new psych doctor to our hospital. There was promises that things would get better because this doc unlike the last was really dedicated. In the last several months we have had a lot of problems on our psych ward, as you can tell by my posts. The nurses were pulling their hair out and we have been having to restrain a lot more patients and administration frowns on that. The old psych doctor has decided to practice elsewhere (trust me he needs to) and they brought in a very popular doc.

Upon the new doctors arrival we had a patient starting to act out. The nurse immediately recognized this acting out to be sun downers syndrome. As the day wore on the patient was growing more and more agitated and psychotic. The counselor started talking to the patient while the RN paged the doctor. The counselor and I were able to talk the patient down, at least we thought.

After 8 hours of paging the Doctor and no response things went down hill. I was patrolling when the RN called over the radio for help. My partner and I took off in a sprint and hit the door like a ton of bricks. When we got down the hallway we found the counselor and RN pinning the patient to the ground. The RN stated that the patient had hit her in the mouth. I called over the radio for a code green (emergency response team needed). What we didn't know was that our operators handling the radio were idiots.

The operator asked if we were going to go to the scene. I told her I was already there. She called no one for help. The RN had to get to the phone to call the clinical coordinator (house supervisor) and he called for assistance. We got the patient into the "quite room" and put her in 3 point restraints. The clinical coordinator checked out the RN and we started documenting. After the incident the clinical coordinator got a hold of the doctor and the new doc got his ass chewed.




The doctor has not been returning pages for the last couple weeks. He claimed that the RN was incompetent and mixed up the last two numbers on the pager. I checked into it and the numbers were indeed correct and the doctor was lying. Now he is saying that the pager the hospital gave him is junk, so he is using his own personal pager. Well now he not answering that one either. I have made a complaint to administration because we are being tied up on the psych unit. The nurses are not aloud to do really anything without doc's permission. The guy is going to get someone killed.
Flashlight 1

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

He Has What???

I had a very stressful yet educational day that involved diseases. In the middle of my shift we were called to report to one of the floors because of an agitated patient. Upon arrival the nurse was standing far away from the room which is normal when a patient is scarring staff. The nurse gave me the patient’s name and room number and asked me to talk to the patient about leaving the room. As my partner entered the room I noticed a yellow cart that holds all the PPE (personal protective equipment). The seal had been broken and a box of masks was on the floor and that’s when it hit me.

Right before we entered the nurse ran like hell away and I yelled, “Is all this stuff for him or for another room?” The nurse stopped and yelled back, “Oh yea I would definitely wear a gown, gloves, mask and shoe covers.” As she turned the corner she shouted what he had, but all I could make out were these few letters “MRVECDIF.” Not knowing what that was I stopped my partner and we got all the gear on, but we were not prepared for what was next.

When we walked in the entire room was covered in urine, feces, and some sticky stuff and no way can this stuff come from a human. The odor would have been an efficient wallpaper remover. Now I know why I had to wear the shoe coverings. Now in the middle of this mess was a 60 year old that had to weigh 90 pounds. On his stomach were a bandage with a tube an
d that weird sticky stuff was oozing out the sides. There was no way this guy could have been terrorizing the floor. I was coming to the conclusion the reason they did not want to deal with him was because of this “MRVECDIF.”

My partner started to discuss with the old man about staying in the room while I went to find his nurse. After searching the entire floor I had the secretary contact her on her companion phone. The nurse was hiding in an empty room, or in her words looking for supplies (room was not the supply room). I asked her why she wanted us to the floor since the guy posed no threat. She stated he was wondering the floor and what he had was highly contagious and it was visiting hours. I asked her to put the guy in seclusion, soft restraints, or at least a posey vest. The nurse said the doctor refused to do any of the above because the doctor would have to come in on his day off.

I went back to the room and the old guy was just sitting in his bed rubbing feces on the bed. Since there was no threat to others we left and I informed his nurse of what was happening. I also let housekeeping know what room to go to because no one should have to sit in a room like that especially with what ever “MRVECDIFF” is.

10 minutes later we were called back to his room, the nurse stated, “The patient was gearing up for something.” She was crying wolf, but I take all reports of threats seriously. Upon arrival the patient was just sitting there playing with his feces again. I called the nurse and told her she needed to order a sitter because I can not legally do anything to him. The nurse asked if I could stand by until they moved the patient next door to a new room. After 40 minutes of standing around and the patient playing in his feces I went to talk to the other nurse tending to the patient that was supposed to be moved. I asked her when she was moving her patient. She told me that her patient was not the problem patient so she was not moving her patient. I said that’s fine and we left the floor. I found the patient’s nurse and asked again what the patient had and she stopped and said lightening fast what sounded like, “MRVECDIFF.” It was almost like she was trying to hide the illness from us.

10 minutes later I get another call from the nurse yelling at me, she said this patient can not be left alone. I told her to order a sitter because the security department did not have the man power to watch patients, patrol several buildings, watch the parking lot, lock up doors, and respond to emergency calls. I returned to the floor to try and find a solution, but they did not want a solution, they wanted us to baby sit the non threatening guy. This went on for hours and finally they decided to move him into a private room and they wanted us to do it. We are not supposed to, but at this point we were both so mad we did the move ourselves. We just had to wait for our psych doctor to check the guy out.

Now earlier I had asked the guy if he knew where he was, what the date was, and asked him where he hurt. The old guy had all the answers; he was acting that way because he was just a jerk. So the doctor walked in and he was done in less than 5 minutes. The doctor came to the same conclusion I did. Now it was time to move the jerk to his new feces, urine, & sticky stuff free room. We covered a wheel chair with sheets wheeled him into his room. As we did that his nurse appeared out of the wood work and said, “Now grab some soap, a wash cloth and wash him. I told her hell no and walked off, that pushed me over the edge.

Basically the whole day the nurse was trying to dump this sick jerk off on us and the psych ward. When I went down stairs to write my report I wanted to know what the hell my partner and I have been exposed to. When I called back I spoke with the secretary because I was so damn mad at the nurse. The secretary finally deciphered the code after trying to figure out what was scaring the staff. What the nurse was yelling was, “He has “MRSA VRE a
nd C DIFF.” I did not know what it was so I jumped on WEB MD.com and after I finished my reading I was slightly upset. It turns out that those things are in the sputum and he defecated and urinated everywhere.

I called our employee heath nurse at home and she said we would be fine as long as we didn’t rub it into any cuts or open sores. Also if we did get infected we would just be under observation and not given antibiotics. I went back to Web MD and it says if you have a drug resistant strain then no antibiotics would work. I called back to the floor and guess what it was a drug resistant strain. Both my partner and I are fine, but not very happy about the fast one the nurse pulled.




Flashlight 1