Happy Belated Nurses Week - Suckers

Oops, I forgot.

That's about the amount of umph ya get from me during nurses week. Bla, bla, bla......nachos, popcorn and a new lunch bag. Woo, woo, woo, woo.

Give me HELP on the floor. Or, relieve me of wiping a hiney so I can get my abx hung on time and my meds out appropriately. That would make feel I'm appreciated.

What Nursing School failed to teach me:
Nursing is for suckers.

I'll have the carpet please

What amazes me about hospital land are the mountains made of ridiculousness. The little, piddly, stuff that means nothing significant gets more time spent on it than is deserved. It gets mulled over, discussed, re-discussed, memos written over it, all sorts of people involved in it, etc. But, the Really important stuff is given it's 2 cents and quickly forgotten about.

For example.

Lets say you have a nurse able to work only light duty following an injury. Some days it's the back, some days it's the shoulder, but, whatever. Say you see her walking around for two days with a list of names correlating to a list of lockers (serious assignment here). You inquire what she's up to and find she is organizing the lockers. Did they need organizing, I wonder? Didn't our Nursing Manager just 'organize' the same thing only a few months ago? How GD important is this shtttiitit folks? I'm drowning here and you are walking around all spaced out in the unit with the same sheet of paper you've had in your hands for the past few days. And, forgive me, but if you are working on 'organizing' lockers wtf are you doing here? Go there, go where the lockers are and walk around like a zombie, strike up meaningless conversation with them. I'm sure they won't mind the interruptions as much as I do.

Now, here is one ya would think someone with a half a brain would want to work on:
The noisiness of the unit. The vent alarms, the call bells, the phone ringing, people from other departments using the nursing station to carry on their personal coffee hour catch up, the televisions blaring, the overhead intercom, the fire alarm (this noise level should be outlawed!).

It's horrific. Unbearable at times. It's very damaging to ears. It's just plain unhealthy. It leads to stress and frustration, the inability to concentrate, the patients pick up this energy as well, and I believe it increases their anxiety. Nothing quiet and soothing about the hospital I'm in.

I made a suggestion that if we can't change the medsurg unit because of it's size we could at least try to change the feng shui in the HOU. I suggested carpeting the inside of the station only, lowering the lighting, decreasing the volume on all the bells and whistles. Boy was I hit with a flurry of 'Can'ts'. Everything from 'nurses don't answer the calls light already', to 'too many germs in the carpet'. Really? Are you planning on having your meals down there.........And, do you actually know of any literature proving it's dirtier than a mopped tiled floor?

How about take locker girl and use her to measure the decibles one must endure during any given moment on the unit and compare that to national acceptable ranges. Engage in some brainstorming for noise reduction. Oh, forget it, yeah, that would require work, thought and effort. Forget that meaningful shiitt, go back to your dazed and confused bullshit of doing NOTHING, ridiculousness.

Fucking idiots, I quit.

I did Compressions

I did compressions, I did compressions.
Oh my God.

I've been through several codes at the REally Great Medical Center, but this time I actually touched the patient. Normally, I'm on the outskirts doing the recording or the running. I've never wanted to touch a dying patient in distress, it's too distressing.

This case was different. I didn't know him so no emotional aspect to overcome. And, the guy was dead as a door nail. Even I knew that. The RT's worked on him for awhile doing the compressions and bagging. I swear to God, they chit-chatted and giggled together, having a social moment right over this poor, dead guy's head. That kind of confirmed for me that he was dead and he wasn't coming back, because usually everyone is very focused with no light blabbing going on.

My moment had come. I finally had the courage to step in and do compressions. I couldn't make the guy any worse and that helped to decrease apprehension.

As I'm pushing away, one RT tells me to keep my elbows straight, the other RT tells me I'm in the right place. I notice I'm getting really warm because I still have on my jacket, I'm also starting to breath a little harder...and I'd just started......what one must feel like after a very long time of doing this!! It's a funny sort of workout.

My hands felt a pop in this dead guy's chest. That 'ick' factor coursed through my body. I guess I had stopped doing compressions inadvertently while my body and mind dealt with the knowledge/experience of popping ribs or sternum or whatever....I hear the guys yell, "Keep going, ya gotta keep going, ya can't just stop." "I think I broke a rib, I felt a pop!" The guys tell me, "You will, that's just part of it."

After only a minute or two I was pretty much done. It's like all those times when you were a kid and you would beg your parents to let you mow the lawn, or do the dishes. Then, with one or two grass strips with the mower, one or two plates washed, you're done. The excitement of getting to do it falls waay down to the bottom of the list of fun things to do. Compressions gave me that same kind of let down.

I didn't stop my 'learning experience there though. I think everyone knew the guy was dead and we were just going by protocol. So, I stepped up to the charge nurse pushing meds and asked if I could do it. It's not like I don't know how to push meds, I just think there is a time when you have to crawl over the threshold, or in my view a fence, into emergency med pushing. A fence I've never been too fond of.

I grabbed some Epi from the box and oh my. Glad the guy was dead because it took me waay too long to figure out what pieces go where, which to pop off, which end to screw into what... Geez, ya would think in emergencies the filled syringes would be something like a 10cc saline flush. Easy, just rip open, attach and push. Maybe the Epi syringe is developed like that to keep the injection at an even rate? I'm not sure, but others were telling me this type is the old kind. I guess I'll find out in the next code.

Nursing is what it is

Still the same ole bull.

What's wrong with giving me the same patients I've had for the past two days....considering I am working three days in a row? Why do you change my assignment ENTIRELY?

Inconvenience someone else for God's Sake. Just because little SusieQ doesn't want to work in HOU....why are you so sure I do? Yet, you are on my trail daily, Begging Me to work Memorial Day and Memorial Day Weekend???? Goes both ways folks. Oh, yeah, you don't get it. And, most likely never will.

So, I am at home today deciding if I should nap or just sit at the computer. Oh, gosh, could be working. Nah, I'd rather enjoy the next 6 days off without the interruption of work. I was going to agree to work Memorial Day and was 2 seconds away from notifying you. That was before I came in on my 3rd, 12 hour shift and found I was floated. Go Ask SusieQ to work, the one who took my assignment.

Now, we all know if the new assignment in HOU had been a sweet one I would agree to work Memorial Day and all would be rosy. But, the crap you gave me on my 3rd, 12hr in a row...well, you need spanked. And, where were you? Where was all your help we 'supposedly' have when things are rough? I've never seen it.

The first patient was a lady who had a huge incontinent episode from the get go. Whole Bed type of thing. Forget any morning coffee, I got to wake up to the smell of something horrible. She also wanted her anxiety medicine...which I found out was Morphine. Hey Bright light bulbs (nurses).....Call the GD doctor and get A FKG order for xanax or something...Don't just pop the old, crusty woman with Morphine. The price ya pay is far greater. Oh, wait, you don't work 3 days in a row, so you don't have to pay the price. I got to do that for ya. So, old woman is jonesing bad for morphine yet she is under the impression it's been given for anxiety. Right.

I get her xanax order, She gets a CXR too. Then her ABG's come back crap, so she is put on BIPAP. Her BP is low, low, low, I hold all the BP meds. Her Pulse is in the 40's all fricking day long. I notify a PA regarding this. No new orders. Patient was tugging at her trach tubing so I had to restrain her. Her long hair had been matted up so badly in the back, lending proof the hair hasn't been combed for a very long time. I felt really sorry for her. I called her son to make sure it was okay to cut the nasty rats out. She looks a 100% better now.

I make rounds on patient no.2. She is grabbing my hand saying, "I'm dying, help me, I'm dying..." I also notice her BP is sky high. She is NPO with a Procadia XL ordered daily. Are you kidding me? I look at her VS history and sure enough.....Sky High, Bottom Out, Sky High, Bottom Out. I looked over a period of several days and was disheartend this had not been dealt with. Procardia drops BP like a rock. Apparently no one thought to Inform the Doctor that you don't (can't - without a sledgehammer) crush Procardia XL, nor does it liquify well enough to go down an NGT, nevermind, what crushing the med is doing to her BP. Right about this moment the son of this patient shows up and semi-freaks because his mother, who is a DNR, has an NGT down her nose. He ranted this wasn't supposed to happen, that the patient had stated she Never wanted a tube, EVER, who made this decision, thought this was all taken care of, blah, blah, blah. I felt like shooting somebody at this point and that would be the person who changed my assignment. To top things off, I paged the doctor 2 times and he isn't calling back! Never did.

The third patient is going for a MBS. Her husband is with her. All in one morning she get's her trach size changed out to smaller, she gets her first shower in more than a month and she is okay'd to eat M.Soft w/ Thin LQ's. Atlas, she passes the swallow eval with flying colors. Then with all the sudden newness of progressing back to normalacy after 5 weeks of hospitalization the lady has a fricking emotional meltdown. A fear-letting moment I suppose & I don't blame her, but damn, I need to get my meds out!!!! Can you hang on a few more minutes so I can do what I need to do, get out of the room, then you and your husband can have your watershed release? It's overdue and warranted, but It's 12:30 and you still don't have your AM meds. shhiittt.

As a result of yet another piss poor day, REally Great Medical Center just bought themselves some agency nurses for the weekend. But not all is lost, they did save on a bag of coffee yesterday since I never Had any. I'm outta here!

I'm glad to be me

Sometimes do you ever have the thought you are REALLY glad to be who you are? This awesome moment rarely comes around for me...Or, maybe I should say the thought is rarely elevated to my level of awareness. Everyday I learn something about myself, about others, about the world. The tidbits are facinating and at the same time, confirming...I'm glad to be me.

I may still run Win98 operating system (boo), I may still be ready to crawl in bed at 8:30pm, I may still opt to hang out at home alone rather than with friends, but I am happy to report it's all okay with me.

I've learned that spending time with your critical shadow is the best medicine to heal yourself of yourself.

Back with more nurse-bitch soon.