Early Saturday - The Character of Man

Circumstances do not make the man, they reveal him.~~James Allen

I am a firm believer that a person's true character is revealed in the ER...

Well I had a pretty pleasant two nights at work on Wednesday and Thursday.  Such a nice change from the previous week.  Whew!  We needed the break.  On Thursday we had a system-wide shut down for upgrades.  It lasted from 8pm until 3am, and then periodic black outs up until the time we left at 7am.  We had to revert to paper charting (oh no, back to the dark ages, lol).  We had to make sure we were keeping track of patients, and solved that problem solved writing names on the Plexiglas at the nurses station.  The other thing we had to accomplish was ordering tests.  We had order sheets where we would write down the requested tests and then call the departments (lab/xray/cardio/) to come do.  It really went much smoother than expected.  Thank goodness!

I got really put out with a couple of patients last night.  I had an ICU patient with a GI bleed.  She had low blood pressure and I had to keep pumping her full of IV fluids and medication to keep it up.  She also needed a blood transfusion and it seemed to take forever to get the blood ready.  I don't know what the lab's problem was with that one.  But when I finally got the first unit of blood I had a new patient in the bed next to her.  He was like "hey, hey, nurse, can you come over here and lower my bed?"  So I said, "I'm in the middle of something here and I'll be over there in a minute."  "But this bed is hurting my back, I need you to lower it now."  Very heavy sigh on my part.  "Sir, I will be with you as soon as I can, I need to help this patient right now."  Over half of this conversation was spoken through a curtain.  I do go right over and fix the bed for him as soon as I'm done hanging the blood.  Then when I go to discharge him a little bit later he keeps interrupting me to ask me "are you from the south?  what part of the south are you from?  I just love southern girls."  Even heavier sigh.  "Please check out in the lobby, sir."

Then I get a new patient during the time I'm getting my patient ready to head over to the ICU.  She goes "nurse, I'm in pain over here."  Heavy sigh.  "I'll be with you as soon as I can."  But I guess that wasn't good enough because the patient said, "But I'm in a lot of pain over here." Heavier sigh.  "And I will be with you as soon as possible.  Right now I'm a little busy."  So I get my ICU patient all bundled with blood infusing, monitor, oxygen, etc and head over to ICU.  I get back, pick up that patient'schart (who must surly be dead by now from all the excruciating pain she was going through) and go into the room.  She looks up at me and very sarcastically said, "Well, you must be very busy because that was more than just a few minutes."  Even heavier sigh, biting my tongue so hard it must be bleeding.  "Ma'am, I am busy.  That lady in the bed next to you was very sick and possibly even dying.  You, however have back pain, and in my 12 years of nursing I have yet to see anyone die because they strained their back.  So even if I weren't busy, someone who is dying will always come before someone who is not.  Now, which side would you like your shot on?"

So okay, if only two people annoyed me all night long it couldn't have been too bad, right?  So how are you?

Oh, and if you haven't met Natalie, pop on over and give her a visit.  A talented lady who offers insight into our ever expanding world.

 Ciao!  De ;)

Tags: The character of man