Sasha
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I just need to rant. Yesterday was a shift from heck, not overly streneous just stressful.
First call of the day, this lady's leg is twisted and contorted from a femur fx, and possibly an ankle fx s/p fall. Family said her leg had been like that for days before the nursing home would send her out. Couldn't locate distal pulses, leg was stone cold, this woman had various bruises and skin tears in various stages of healing. She was quite a sad sight, but just calmly sat there, after asking her if she was in pain after we moved her, she smiled and said "A lady never complains." She was sweet, very confused but very sweet.
Next call was discharge to nursing home. We get there, and had to spend an hour on scene waiting for the patient's family because he didn't want to leave without them. Patient had a stage four sacral wound treated by myocutaneous flaps. This patient HAD to have an airmattress and HAD to lay flat. Even had an order for it. Well in that hour that we were waiting, the nurse didn't care to tell us they didn't have the correct mattress at the nursing home for the patient. My mistake for assuming they wouldn't discharge him until the nursing home could accept him with the proper equipment. We loaded him up after tracking down two nurses to four point him and make the sheet pull as comfortable and easy as possible. And we do really well. Load him into the stretcher. Family is following. Get to nursing home and are met at the room saying they don't have the mattress and wont accept him because they don't have the proper equipment. They were really sweet and said they'd told the nurse that several times while she was calling report.
So. They wont accept the patient. OK, well, called dispatch. They already had cleaned his room when we left and we couldn't bring him back there, so we're heading to the ER. We have nothing else to do with this patient. Take him to the ER, outside in the truck we are met by a nurse who said they wont take the patient either (dispatch had called them.) met outside. So we sit there for half an hour on and off the phone to figure out what to do. The patient, who is on the worst possible mattress, goes from a 5/10 pain to a "15/10 pain" is in TEARS. A big burly "former gangster" (Self described) is in TEARS begging for us to just take him home. His family was in tears seeing him like that. Which of course, we can't. We were so irritated. Finally told to head back to the nursing home and put him on a regular mattress.
get there. Go to seek out nurses or CNAs to help. They're P/O'd beyond belief that they have to help, refuse to help until they've gone through all of the paperwork etcetc.. mean while our patient is outrageously in pain. We finally get him off and the first thing the cna does despite being told by both me and the patient "No, he's not allowed to sit up" sits him up til the nurse comes in and says he can't sit up. The entire call took four hours. We were starving by the time we were done but did not have a chance to stop ALL night.
Next patient is a 102 year old miserable man who'se grandson is a former nurse. Patient is confused and sweet. Grandson does not believe in hospice care, and talks to us like we're morons. "Do you know what renal means? It means kidney.. do you know what necrotic means?" and goes on to tell me that in 30 years we will have nano technology and no one will ever get sick or die and we will all never age past 30. He talked down to us... and he was incorrect with nearly everything he said. I was angry to be talked down to like a child.. my partner has a bachelor's in biology, I am no moron either... Jesus!
Then next couple of patients were all mellow (although one poor man was convinced he was dying due to a little blood in his urine), but I got off two and a half hours late. Also at a drop off, my partner forgot to lock her door on her way out, her GPS and my scope was jacked. Thank god I keep my wallet with me! So I'm scopeless and stuck using the crappy provided ones until I can replace.
I'm just incredibly frustrated, I think sometimes people forget that the patients they are dealing with are actual PEOPLE and not slabs of meat on the stretcher. They feel pain, they get distressed.... And we need to have sensitivity for these people, be their advocate, not ignore them or treat them as an inconvience and send them out of the hospital without proper equipment because you want one less patient to deal with that night.
Nurses were not on my happy list last night.
First call of the day, this lady's leg is twisted and contorted from a femur fx, and possibly an ankle fx s/p fall. Family said her leg had been like that for days before the nursing home would send her out. Couldn't locate distal pulses, leg was stone cold, this woman had various bruises and skin tears in various stages of healing. She was quite a sad sight, but just calmly sat there, after asking her if she was in pain after we moved her, she smiled and said "A lady never complains." She was sweet, very confused but very sweet.
Next call was discharge to nursing home. We get there, and had to spend an hour on scene waiting for the patient's family because he didn't want to leave without them. Patient had a stage four sacral wound treated by myocutaneous flaps. This patient HAD to have an airmattress and HAD to lay flat. Even had an order for it. Well in that hour that we were waiting, the nurse didn't care to tell us they didn't have the correct mattress at the nursing home for the patient. My mistake for assuming they wouldn't discharge him until the nursing home could accept him with the proper equipment. We loaded him up after tracking down two nurses to four point him and make the sheet pull as comfortable and easy as possible. And we do really well. Load him into the stretcher. Family is following. Get to nursing home and are met at the room saying they don't have the mattress and wont accept him because they don't have the proper equipment. They were really sweet and said they'd told the nurse that several times while she was calling report.
So. They wont accept the patient. OK, well, called dispatch. They already had cleaned his room when we left and we couldn't bring him back there, so we're heading to the ER. We have nothing else to do with this patient. Take him to the ER, outside in the truck we are met by a nurse who said they wont take the patient either (dispatch had called them.) met outside. So we sit there for half an hour on and off the phone to figure out what to do. The patient, who is on the worst possible mattress, goes from a 5/10 pain to a "15/10 pain" is in TEARS. A big burly "former gangster" (Self described) is in TEARS begging for us to just take him home. His family was in tears seeing him like that. Which of course, we can't. We were so irritated. Finally told to head back to the nursing home and put him on a regular mattress.
get there. Go to seek out nurses or CNAs to help. They're P/O'd beyond belief that they have to help, refuse to help until they've gone through all of the paperwork etcetc.. mean while our patient is outrageously in pain. We finally get him off and the first thing the cna does despite being told by both me and the patient "No, he's not allowed to sit up" sits him up til the nurse comes in and says he can't sit up. The entire call took four hours. We were starving by the time we were done but did not have a chance to stop ALL night.
Next patient is a 102 year old miserable man who'se grandson is a former nurse. Patient is confused and sweet. Grandson does not believe in hospice care, and talks to us like we're morons. "Do you know what renal means? It means kidney.. do you know what necrotic means?" and goes on to tell me that in 30 years we will have nano technology and no one will ever get sick or die and we will all never age past 30. He talked down to us... and he was incorrect with nearly everything he said. I was angry to be talked down to like a child.. my partner has a bachelor's in biology, I am no moron either... Jesus!
Then next couple of patients were all mellow (although one poor man was convinced he was dying due to a little blood in his urine), but I got off two and a half hours late. Also at a drop off, my partner forgot to lock her door on her way out, her GPS and my scope was jacked. Thank god I keep my wallet with me! So I'm scopeless and stuck using the crappy provided ones until I can replace.
I'm just incredibly frustrated, I think sometimes people forget that the patients they are dealing with are actual PEOPLE and not slabs of meat on the stretcher. They feel pain, they get distressed.... And we need to have sensitivity for these people, be their advocate, not ignore them or treat them as an inconvience and send them out of the hospital without proper equipment because you want one less patient to deal with that night.
Nurses were not on my happy list last night.
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