Now that I have a few minutes to breathe…}
I did ask my daughter about the nursing situation and she said her issue is she is one person and they expect her to do the work of 5 people. Short staffed, too many patients to 1 nurse ratio, just so hard to do her job without everyone saying that isn't my job when help is needed. The paper work is also overwhelming at the end of the shift trying to get it all caught up. She works for a large "company" that has bought out a lot of the hospitals in the area and are part of a teaching hospital system. It isn't an easy job.
Lynxstch I am appalled by the lack of good treatment your DH is being given. And they say that those connected to a university hospitals are supposed to be so much better than our small town poedunk hospitals here in MT. My Mother in law was in the hospital earlier this year for a knee replacement surgery when they discovered fluid on her lungs. From what I have been told the longest that they ever waited for a call light to be answered was 5 minutes and if the nurse or cna who answered the call needed to get someone else like respiratory that person was there within 10-15 minutes or else the nurse was back in the room to check if it was going to be longer because the person was with another patient.
This is how it is when staffing levels are correct. This is how it is where I am, thankfully.
There is little doubt in my mind that the unit where Mr Lynxstch is is not adequately staffed. This is an administration problem. All the demanding, and patient advocates in the world, aren’t going to help that problem if there are not enough people to provide adequate care to the patients they have. And it sure sounds like they don’t.
I have worked in a hospital like that. Every day I sobbed my way home, thinking I’d made the wrong career choice. I was actually sleepwalking at night, asking DH to help me “pass meds”, I was so chronically stressed. It was him who told me I really needed to find a new job. My head nurse at the time (now called “Director”) told me it was “no better anywhere else”. Patients, who were usually so sweet (Veterans, whom I love), were almost afraid to ask us anything because they knew we were crazy busy trying to do work that required way more people than we actually had. I never got out on time, I always stayed at least an hour late every day. My lunch, if I got one, was spent gobbling down some bites of food with one hand while doing paperwork with the other. And though they touted lots of vacation time, I was never allowed to take any! So I eventually made the difficult decision to leave before I had a breakdown (which one of my friends from there actually did). And thankfully I did because it was like night and day when I went somewhere else. Going somewhere with adequate staffing levels made all the difference. I then actually had time to spend with my patients, where I never did previously. And it certainly wasn’t that I didn’t want to. I am the same nurse no matter where I work, but the tools I had to work with were very different in each place, if that makes sense. It’s sad to see young nurses wanting to leave the profession before they even start. But that’s what happens when they’re beaten down day after day, shift after shift. Believe me, no nurse is happy knowing their patients and families aren’t happy. It’s a horrible feeling. Nurses go into nursing because they care about people and want to help them. So it’s more than disheartening when you are unable to; it leads to burnout.
When you see nurses on picket lines over “staffing”, this is what they’re talking about.
So that’s that.
But I will say, besides that (which has always been a problem in certain places), what we are seeing now as a trend in hospitals - post-pandemic - are a lot of problems that are really unprecedented in many ways. There has been a lot of movement of staff for various reasons. Hear me out, just so people have an understanding. We (who work in hospitals) are all still learning these things ourselves, too, in many ways.
Staff were beaten down - badly - caring for Covid patients. It was a nightmare that few can really understand unless you lived it. Many staff have little left to give. There were injuries and illnesses, as well as losses of family members and caring for family members. Some had Covid themselves and may be suffering with Long Covid. Some decided to leave altogether. Some moved on to other jobs that are maybe less difficult than bedside nursing. Many places have a whole new wave of staff who are not as skilled as the older ones who left, which means things take longer or may not be as efficient as someone who performs the same tasks who has more experience. These are trends being seen everywhere post pandemic. The other side of it is that many people didn’t want to leave their homes for a year even to get medical care. They were afraid to go to hospitals. And now all those people need care, and in many cases, it’s become more complex. So acuity and censuses are up, but the ability to staff this increased needs is not there. As soon as staff is replaced, someone else leaves. I ran into an old friend I worked with 30 years ago this weekend. I actually had to almost counsel them during our conversation, because what they were describing to me was PTSD, but I don’t think they recognized it. They are just trying to survive. And they looked like hell. So sad for me to see. And a real eye opener that, I think, typifies how many of us feel. Leave? You say. Well, if everyone left who is feeling this way, there wouldn’t be many people left to care for everyone, as it’s very widespread. So lots of issues with caregivers right now. People called us heroes and said they were grateful for what we did during the pandemic, but, in practice and reality, it doesn’t always feel like we were supported. I’ll just leave it at that.
This is just a very, very small glimpse into the complexities of caregiving in hospitals today, in the profession I love and have devoted my career to. Calling us names and assaulting us is often too much to bear. I noticed a thread recently which kept referring to how badly retail workers are treated. I was waiting to hear someone talk about how badly medical staff are treated, but it never came.
I thought about temporarily leaving this thread, but decided this was the better route, for me.
I spent a lot of time in hospitals myself with my mother, and with my kids over the years. As I mentioned before, I have experienced the frustrations, and worse. My strategy, just to share, was to treat the staff really well, and to always bring in a big container of candy meant to share. Why? Because it makes that room a happy room, and, along with friendliness, brings staff in to chat and grab some candy, which then causes people to want to go out of their way to help. Because staff will do that. The opposite is true, too - if staff know they’re going to get reamed they will avoid that room. When people ask me advice about their family members being in the hospital, I always tell them to be really nice to the staff. It does help.
In this particular situation, I will try to give a little insight into some questions I’ve wondered about while reading. Why was he using a bedpan when there was talk he was either going to rehab or going home? I understand there were issues with getting him out of bed and waiting for PT, but these are decisions that nurses are supposed to make using critical thinking skills and judgement. But that depends on how well they are supported in the organization. Where I am not only is it ok, it’s expected we will make these decisions. I couldn’t work anywhere else (and wouldn’t have been very good at what I do had I not been able to work that way). I likely would’ve had him at minimal using a bedside commode. It’s a simple pivot for even the most debilitated person with a one or two assist and a commode right next to the bed. This allows bowels to actually empty fully, whereas a bedpan does not.
We also see delays for various reasons. Weekends and holidays are notorious, even though we operate 24/7, obviously. July isn’t a great time to be in the hospital because lots of people are on vacation and it is also the time that the new interns start in a teaching hospital. Combine that with newer nurses, as well, and care will not be as efficient. One of my patients this weekend was bumped every day from a procedure he was waiting for. He was very understanding and made the right decision to wait when family members were telling him he should leave. The one assurance I could offer him was that his being bumped meant that there were others ahead of him who were worse off than he was. He understood completely.
I was thinking about some of my own hospital issues. Not too long ago my DS was in the hospital with a very serious issue that he could’ve died from. All the nurses were very nice. Some even moved him, unrequested, from a makeshift office room turned patient room, into a bigger regular room, and got me a chair so I could stay with him. They liked us. Well, one day a nurse came in and didn’t like the idea that I was even there, and barked at DS when he asked a simple question. She tried to pull rank on me saying she’d been a nurse for 20 years. (Just a baby! Lol) She was overheard out at the nurse’s station talking about us in front of several nurses and a doctor. I simply went over there and asked for the charge nurse, saying we’d like a different nurse that day. They asked why, and I said because it was unprofessional for his nurse to be out here talking about us so that we could hear it in the room. The doctor interjected and I told her it wasn’t an issue for her, this was a nursing issue. Fortunately a very nice young nurse spoke out and said she’d be happy to be his nurse, and she was a sweetie. I later talked to the director about several things, but mainly that one. She couldn’t believe it, saying that the nurse who was talking about us has a son my son’s age and she would’ve absolutely stayed with him, too, under the same circumstances, etc. She also said she was going to address the issues on rounds. But really, nurses don’t need to be told that it’s unprofessional to be talking about patients derogatorily so they can hear them. That is Nursing 101 and every nurse knows it. Same with a lot of things, some of which have been discussed here. They know. But again, different hospitals use different protocols and have different policies and procedures so you/I never know exactly how it is at any given hospital. When possible I like to get care at my own hospital because there are few surprises. My babies were delivered there, and my mother chose to have her hip repaired there. As a matter of fact, the day she broke her hip the NP asked her if she wanted to go to a different, closer hospital to make it easier on me. My mother spoke up:”That butcher shop? No way! I want to go where she works (pointing to me)! I like it there!” And so we went. And so I was so relieved when the head of the ER came in and reassured her they would do her surgery. And the nurses were great, even though I provided some of her care myself, as I did with my kids and DH when they were hospitalized, etc. i know how busy everyone is and I don’t take offense to that. The only thing I take offense to is when people are rude or unprofessional.
). I myself had one bad nurse when I had Josh - we were there for 3 1/2 days (he was a c-section) and my first nurse the morning after giving birth (at 7 p.m. the previous night) was awful. She must have reported me to the nursing supervisor, because later in the afternoon, the supervisor came in and yelled at me about "policy" as well. But out of the 9 or 10 nurses I had during my stay, that was the only unpleasant one.
so ridiculous...
Oh well....I'm going to have DD try again late tonight or early tomorrow morning if I don't get in tonight and if we can't get the tickets I want, no big deal. I'm only paying for the cheaper days which are already crazy expensive. 
