Close Encounter of the Nurse Kind

when was the last time you were the nurse!!

you know i read this article and happen to have worked at the particular ED you are speaking about. I do understand that you felt a lack of concern shown by the ED staff however there are reasons that people sit in a waiting room, and trust me if the nurse behind the desk acted as if everything was a lifethreatening emergency then no one would see the doc, cause lets just face it there wouldn't be enough!!....most of the time the ED at cox is very busy and people wait for hours if you have a problem with it go up the street to st johns where the wait is just as long and at times longer.....most of us out there at triage are very concerned about the patients that we triaged, but what can you do when the upper management cant move people in the back so that you can get your sick waiting room of pts to the nurses and docs in the back????......it is the same no matter where you go this day in age in the emergency room, lets face it we could have a 100bed ER there and we would still have people waiting, i have been places where there have been deaths in the waiting room and i remember when i used to work and came in for another shift and saw some of the same people in the waiting room as when i left, its not that bad in springfield yet but in some places it is......hope you can turn this around and use it to educate future nurses, but lay off the one of us that are on the front lines of the hospital system when we are doing the best we can with what we have!!!!!!!

hope your daughter continues to improve and get back to her normal self, and relax your a mom first and a nurse second!!!!

er care

I have been an ER nurse for 35 years. I can say for a fact that all of us feel terrible about the long waits. We beg for beds and are told none are available. We are constantly being verbally abused by waiting patients and their family members.

What can one do when there are 5 or more squads standing around in the halls waiting for the same stretchers you are waiting for? I must agree that those who aren't "living it" have no idea what's going on. We care! Management and CEO's are only looking at the dollar signs! It takes an act of God to go on diversion so we can just get caught up! We are understaffed! We have been doing protocols; but, these patients go back for their IV and labs and end up right back in the waiting room. I feel badly that another nurse would have the nerve to complain and not try to look at the whole picture.

Poor quality of care

I too have just experienced basically the same situation, several times over. Not just the ER but also in the ICU. My mother was in the ER 11 hours and still had not been seen by a doctor. And because she needed the bedpan more than once (she is on Lasix) they took her call bell away because she was ringing too much!!!! When my sister questioned this the nurse managers response was, She did not believe that and where were you? My mother was in the ICU prior to this for 7 days, and was sent home with an abdomen that looked like she was 7 months pregnant, and yes she ended up back in for emergency surgery for an obstruction less than 24 hours after she was sent home. I do not live close by so I could not be there everyday so I had little control and even though I was listed on her records they refused to even talk to me on the phone so it was useless to even call. In the last two years I have been on the other side of the bed and the experiences I have had leave me with a very bad taste in my mouth for the nursing profession. I could go on and on but suffice to say there is definitely a great deal lacking in the care given not only to the patient but even in just communicating with the families.

Nursing and what it means...

I read this article with interest. I have been on both sides of care--myself, my husband, our son, and various family members and nowI am a first semester nursing student, who is married with 2 children. I am amazed that the instructor behaved like she did. Tantrums? Yelling? God forbid if I as my children's mother acted like that. And how do you not see the signs and symptoms? I have drama queens but as a mother, you just have a gut feeling when something isn't quite right...and you are to teach us? And then the comments about caring--evidently she should have a chat with my clinical instructor as well as one with one of the primary nurses on our floor--med surg.trauma. You are not to be friendly or caring as the pt. will stay here longer, or you are a walking lawsuit--these people are vulnerable (duh) and consequently, can form unhealthy attachments therefore leading to a lawsuit. I have been told by my clinical instructor --to stop caring and to stop smiling. Since when is nursing not the caring profession? IAnd why can't you smile, care and still be efficient? The power of a smile is an amazing thing. I am appalled at some of the 'care' I have seen and have vowed not to be one of those nurses. Jeeze lady, I think you were the one to get a wake-up call. On another note, I think its a sad day when the charting takes longer to do than the assessment...

Compassion=Nursing

I to have been on both sides of the bed, one as a hospice nurse, the other as a granddaughter, neice, mother and wife. I to have had to agrue with MD's who insisted that my Husband did not have a TA, but all the signs/symptoms pointed to it. After arguing with the MD, he fineally did do a CT.....guess what....One Hospital I was in for my daughter who has intermittent seizures, the MD gave 3xs the amount of antiseizure meds when I was out of the room! With Grandma, the nurse gave an extra dose of ativan bacause shewas to figity and did not want to deal with her.......ON the other hand, I have come across many Nurses whom I work with and deal with on the "other side of the bed" that deserve Nurse of the Year.....My hope is that as time goes by, Nursing does not lose the Tenderness that is needed.

Fair Reporting

Erika feels that Ms. Madsen has been scolded for criticizing nursing.....that is not the case. The truth is that if she wants to play journalist, then all of the questions: who, what, where, why, when and how must be answered. Credible journalists present all of the facts. She didn't do her homework! What was written was an emotional piece that was extremely skewed, and illuminated nurses as the reason for any problem she or her family encountered during her hospital experience. This was a perfect opportunity to showcase the failures of the healthcare system, and the varied reasons behind them. Instead, she chose to throw her peers and former students under the bus.

I take exception to anyone who thinks nurses should've born the brunt of her criticism and comments. I also take exception to her comments about aiding in her daughter's recovery. That is what family education is all about! Since recovery will start and continue through discharge and beyond, it's important that the significant people in the patients life are initiated into their routines while in the hospital-it was better that her daughter used the tools necessary to recover with her mother, than with strangers. Again that is the mother or father's job-parent, advocate, associate healer.

Again, I have to wonder what type of nurses are the "outraged nurses", I suppose if I had a 1:1, or 1:2 patietn ratio along with a tech....I'd think that every nurse had time to rub feet, brush hair, or whatever else. However, the majority of us are running around to provide ADEQUATE, LIFESAVING, LIFE SUSTAINING CARE, in an environment that does not support us or the patients.

Get with the program!

a better experience

I am sorry your daughter had such an ordeal with her appendix. I hope she is feeling better now! I too am a nurse with over 20 years ICU experience, who ended up at my 14 year old daughter's bedside in the ED and pediatric ICU late last year. We were far more fortunate in our experiences with hospital staff. My daughter's illness was sudden and I too blew her off as being overly dramatic. My colleagues at the hospital where I work immediately recognized that she was in impending shock, took the appropriate actions, and battled to successfully save her life. ALL were professional, effecient and courteous, but also sympathetic and comforting. When she was transferred to the children's hospital 99% of the staff there were also excellent, professional, and compassionate. That being said, either myself or my husband was at her bedside 24/7, watching, asking and helping with her care.. As a nurse who tries to always give 110 percent, I recognize that I am human, get tired and hungry, and can even be judgemental (though I try to never let this affect my care), and realized that the nurses and doctors caring for my daughter could possibly be human too! But I would like to take exception to the responders "scolding" Ms. Madsen for publically criticizing our profession because other healthcare professions don't. The opposite should be true. Other healthcare professionals should have the courage and ethical standards to hold up the failings of their professions to public scrutiny, as she has done. The public is us, and in the end, how well we serve "them" is truly how well we end up serving ourselves.

Have you seen this?

All I can add to this is: Have you seen Glenn Beck's report of his ED experience after recent surgery? Check it out on CNN.com These reports make me ashamed of even more of my fellow ED Nurses.

I don't care what you call it, Burn Out, Compassion Fatigue or any other buzz word. If you act like this, please leave bedside nursing! If you no longer actually "Care" about and for your patients, LEAVE!

Before you write me off as a goody two shoes, newbie nurse, I will tell you I have been a Nurse at the bedside for 33 yrs. 3 yrs in ICU/CCU, 30 yrs. in ED. I am a Clinical Nurse IV at a Metropolitan Medical Center (Trauma Center).

I still love what I do, and I believe I make a difference to my patients. I get as much as I give to my patients. If you do not, do all of us a favor, especially the patients, and find something else to do as a job. Nursing isn't a job, it is a profession.

Triage RN

I use a cellphone in triage. I call the charge nurse and beg them to get the doctors to discharge patients because I can't stop staring at a neonate I triaged - I am afraid he is going to crash in the waiting room. I don't have proof, just nurse's intuition.

I have a flat affect while I triage an 8 year old with a fever because 2 hours ago I sent a 10 year old asthmatic to the waiting room who is getting q 2 hour nebs at home and he was still retracting in my booth. I stare past this 8 year old to look at the neonate again, but the baby is wrapped in a blanket and out of my sight. I get a bad feeling in my stomach. I try to remember I must go out and see the baby while at the same time I document a list of allergies, meds, pmh, psh, etc... I see a 4 year old with a bloody bandage who is crying, but at least he is breathing better than the 8 month old bronchiolitic with a borderline pulse-ox sitting 5 chairs away from him.

After the 8 year old leaves the triage booth and I finish my documentation, I hear a trauma stat called over our communication system, "16 year old female assualt victim, head trauma, unresponsive," and I think, "I forgot the allergy band on the 8 year old". I leave my booth to find him, but the family went straight to the cafeteria. I glance at the neonate and he is still breathing regularly. The 4 year old with the gross and bloody bandage on his head (that his parents would not let me change) is really crying now, and the families are asking me why I will not do anything for him.

I ask the asthmatic child how he is doing, but he can't speak because his airway has gotten so tight. The charge nurse calls me on the cellphone to ask me to help in the trauma room because there are 2 other children crashing in the department, I tell him to make room for 1 more. I think of the 15 other children I triaged who I can't take a second glance at and the 15 more left to triage.

My eyes well up with tears. Someone says something ridiculous and borderline inappropriate knowing I am about to cry. I laugh out loud instead. I ask somebody to order me some food because I am 10 hours into my 12 hour shift and at least I can take some food home. (The ED only gets worse at 5 pm because everyone starts coming home from work). I laugh one more time at the craziness of this place and I press on.

How about an article that does into the detail of what an ER nurse does in his/her day? That way both sides of the story are presented and we are not just getting Ms. Madsen's story. There are two sides involved.

Anyhow, shame on her for blaming the nurses. I'm an ICU nurse and sometimes I realize that I don't smile often but I do give my patients words of encouragement. I do what I need to do for my patient so that they stay alive and get well. I'm sorry if I don't smile enough.