I apologize

Specialties Emergency

Published

To my ER colleagues, I am very sorry. Sometimes you try and try and try to teach patients about what symptoms require ER visits vs PCP or urgent care clinic. You can only beat your head into a wall so long before throwing your hands up and telling them to do whatever they want.Again, I'm sorry, I really did try. :(

Specializes in Family practice, emergency.

I think more and more ED's are developing to include a "minor care" department. If we had a system that had a 24 hour urgent care we would have ED's less clogged and less overwhelmed nurses... believe me, I had to go for stitches at 2 am once and I felt so guilty about walking past all the RN's and docs I knew, but where else was I supposed to go?

Specializes in Med-Surg.
I don't want to see a horse on PCP, bad enough all the homeless on it! :)

There's a comedian who does a bit about some B-list celebrity who was arrested for DUI while under the influence of PCP. Apparently he thought he WAS a horse!

Would have loved to be a fly on the wall of that police interview lol.

Specializes in Med-Surg.
I think more and more ED's are developing to include a "minor care" department. If we had a system that had a 24 hour urgent care we would have ED's less clogged and less overwhelmed nurses... believe me, I had to go for stitches at 2 am once and I felt so guilty about walking past all the RN's and docs I knew, but where else was I supposed to go?

Well see there is a huge difference between using the ER during hours when no Urgent cares are open, to something happening in full daylight, near one of the biggest metro areas in the country where I'm sure she could find something if she really wanted to. She just has an addiction to the ER. I don't know if it's an attention thing, or hypochondria, or what, but it just drives me nuts to continually reinforce education that goes in one ear and out the other!

Specializes in Family practice, emergency.

@Jeweles26 I agree with you and I must say I always enjoy your posts.

Specializes in Emergency.

Just think of it all as job security...

Specializes in being a Credible Source.
I tell my family and friends, "ARE YOU GOING TO DIE?!" Then it can wait.
Believe me, I agree... but also see the fallacy in the reasoning as I've seen several patients die because they didn't present with the sx of sepsis nearly soon enough.

Before I became a nurse, I very nearly lost my own mother and my own daughter by delaying trips to the ER.

I think the SIRS triggers should be getting the same publicity as do stroke and chest pain.

Specializes in Emergency/Cath Lab.
Well see there is a huge difference between using the ER during hours when no Urgent cares are open, to something happening in full daylight, near one of the biggest metro areas in the country where I'm sure she could find something if she really wanted to. She just has an addiction to the ER. I don't know if it's an attention thing, or hypochondria, or what, but it just drives me nuts to continually reinforce education that goes in one ear and out the other!

We have one like that too. Comes in every few days cause of her "migraines" but refuses to get care outside the ER. Its so bad she asks which doc is working and if it is a certain one, she just leaves.

Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Can I just say that although it may not seem like an emergency to you, a headache can be a symptom of something more sinister!! Instead of assuming how about asking 'when is the pain worse?' Or 'do you have any visual issues/disturbances?' If the answers are in the morning and yes then get a neuro-ophthalmologist to look for papiloedma which is indicative of IIH!!!

I don't think this sort of thing is what the original vent was about. We all know about "the worst headache I've ever had". Even me, and I'm an ICU nurse. I think the OP was venting about folks who go to the ER for no good reason . . . .

Specializes in PCCN.

Or, how bout the folks who get sent in, and wonder why they are there? Had a lady sent in from dialysis. no cp, some hypotension, ekg changes- supposedly.She even told me she didn't know why she was there. As we reviewed her ekg and compared it to others from 2010- they were all the same!! That was a bogus admission , and it wasn't even her fault!

Also had another pt who apparently was drug seeking- she had a aicd, and kept"getting into accidents" where her seat belt would cause bruising at her site.You can only do that so many times before you go hmmmmm.

Specializes in ER, ICU.
Can I just say that although it may not seem like an emergency to you, a headache can be a symptom of something more sinister!! Instead of assuming how about asking 'when is the pain worse?' Or 'do you have any visual issues/disturbances?' If the answers are in the morning and yes then get a neuro-ophthalmologist to look for papiloedma which is indicative of IIH!!!

Ok... Really?? Lets not get too over the top.

I work in an ER, and while this isn't a popular stance I have thought a lot about what would happen if all the frequent flyers up and decided to go to their PCP and be responsible patients... the answer? I would be bored. I know wait times are crazy and that the ER is overused but at the same time my hospital has hired a lot of new nurses to help cover the influx of patients. That means more jobs at a great hospital that offers amazing benefits. Also it keeps us busy, which means our skills are honed and we are on our toes. Would it be nice to have some quiet days and enjoy a steady but manageable pt flow? Sure, but for the most part I work in the ER because I get a great deal of satisfaction out of managing many different crisis', running my rear off and in general doing 5 different things at once. If I didn't like the frenetic pace and crazy shifts I would work in a different department. I might be the only one that feels this way, but there are days I am grateful for that guy who is here every week for some new malady, it's keeps things moving. Don't get me wrong, I don't want it being paid for by my taxes, mind you... but that is a discussion for another thread on another day.

Specializes in Pediatric Private Duty; Camp Nursing.

I've been to the ER for a headache, about 12 years ago. It was the first and last migrane in my life. I had no idea what was wrong with me, but I had felt some bubbling feeling in the back of my head and it really freaked me out. I wasn't a nurse at the time, so I might have reacted differently, but I thought something very terrible was happening to me and it was very scary. When a person doesn't have a medical background and has some new, drastic symptoms, it might seem like an emergency to them. Incidentally, they made me wait over three hours. Longest in my life. I sobbed the whole time.

Specializes in ER.

WTH is IIH?

If it takes a double specialtied doc to diagnose it, I probably will go with "migraine" until there are other symptoms.

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