Do you work at Hilton?

Nurses General Nursing

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Nurses, do you ever feel like you work at the Hilton?

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While I am getting your 25th soda, my other patient peed her pants......

We nurses aren't there for pants peeing. The Chief Financial Administrator, the Marketing Director, the Business Office and the CEO just hasn't got around to telling us yet who is. Their waiting until we get our ADIET script down pat.

They are perfecting the sell job first- that's the first priority. And before we get to patient care, they will first be installing cash registers (computerized, of course, complete with digital bar code scanners) at the what used to be the nursing desk- it will now become the Unit Specific Customer Service Department and Lay-a-Way!! The patients will now have a menus and place an order so they can choose their "services" they came for. Customized Hospitalization.

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Specializes in LTC and School Health.

Many hospitals are implementing the "disney institute". Which means employees are required to give customer service to patients as if they are at disney world. IDK. Seems like we are getting away from nursing every day.

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Many hospitals are implementing the "disney institute". Which means employees are required to give customer service to patients as if they are at disney world. IDK. Seems like we are getting away from nursing every day.

These healthcare system can amusement park and department store and spa the hospital all they want- the CMS is no dummy. They know what patients are supposed to receive in the line of healthcare and they know they are not getting it because the healthcare professionals that are there for that purpose are being harassed and distracted by all this administrative fluffy crap that has nothing to do with treating illness.

Has anyone been into any of the newer built LTC facilites lately? The entrances look like you are entering a hotel lobby complete with chandeliers and the nurses wear short white consultation jackets. These places are completely decorated with the Tuscany flair or the Zen motifs with orchid filled vases installed on the wall like HGTV came to decorate. The stairs are now these stainless stell and glass siderails. The walls are now full length windows to the depatments- PT, OT and the administrative offices. Where the residents get their hair washed used to be called the beauty salon now looks like an expensive day spa salon. That is also what these newer hospitals are being built as. There are 5 brand new hospitals around me- all in less than a 100 mile radus of each other, nothing wrong with the old ones which are still standing, they were not condemed. These are multimillion dollar wastes of money!!! Towers of futuristic glass- what extravagance and waste. And this country has millions of people unemployed and withut health insurance. The one saving grace is one of these newly opened hospitals are going bankrupt- can;t pay it's new monthly mortgage payment- Not enough patients to fill the 500 beds it created for itself.

Guess they didn't get the memo- gotta have the sick people who qualify(CMS and Insurance) to be admitted first!!! Some one on that Board of Mistrustees wasn't using any common sense on that decision. All those on this site who are from the Philly area know which 5 healthcare systems( Virtua, Capital Health, Aria, Einstein, and Princeton) I am taking about and which one is going under!!!!( Capital Health)

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Specializes in Med/surg, Quality & Risk.
ROFL, I'll keep this in mind as I start nursing school! :sarcastic:

@Ntheboat2: Some lady got angry with me because her "Mom has orders (LOL) for coffee at every meal! Where is it?!"

OMG....I'm sorry this isn't good customer service, but I like to point out how silly these statements are. "Really, she has 'orders' for coffee? Which doctor ordered coffee for the patient?" This can go on for five minutes.

BTW, there are a lot of holier than thou types on the Facebook link to this post. We are all horrible nurses because we resent having to bend to patients' personal preferences and whims instead of using this valuable time to take care of their health problems! How DARE you express frustration when you are off the clock!

"Scripts." I've got bad news for management, I'm a horribile actress.

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I was referred to as "the waitress" two separate times today.

I am the supervisor of nursing.

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I can't tell you the amount of times I've had patients expect me to fix their TVs or get them TVs. Once, on a very busy day, a patient was ringing his call bell constantly because he hadn't received his TV yet. I had to tell him that us nurses don't bring the TVs, the TV people do that and they don't usually round on our floor until dinnertime at the earliest. He was very upset about that, kept ranting at me about poor service and "How am I supposed to be entertained around here?" and such...I just threw up my hands in the air and left the room.

You might want to keep the phone number for the TV folks handy and be able to give it to the patient. This should help keep the patient off of your back. Or just tell them to dial the big O for Operator for any department - laundry, kitchen, gift shop, and so forth.

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OMG....I'm sorry this isn't good customer service, but I like to point out how silly these statements are. "Really, she has 'orders' for coffee? Which doctor ordered coffee for the patient?" This can go on for five minutes.

BTW, there are a lot of holier than thou types on the Facebook link to this post. We are all horrible nurses because we resent having to bend to patients' personal preferences and whims instead of using this valuable time to take care of their health problems! How DARE you express frustration when you are off the clock!

"Scripts." I've got bad news for management, I'm a horribile actress.

Some doctors do actually order coffee, alcohol, or whatever.

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And that's the problem. I wouldn't dream of walking into a law firm and evaluating the lawyers because I know next to nothing about how to practice law. It's the same for patients- they don't know how to be nurses. (With, of course, the exception of patients who really are nurses, excluding those who work in a hospital and wear scrubs but aren't really nurses.)

I'm not a lawyer, but I know that there are deadlines to filing papers, there are certain rules and procedures to be followed. All this from watching "Law and Order".

So pts might know something about Nursing - think of "Grey's Anatomy" and so on. Or maybe they've had nurses care for them or their loved ones in the past.

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ROFL, I'll keep this in mind as I start nursing school! :sarcastic:

@Ntheboat2: Some lady got angry with me because her "Mom has orders (LOL) for coffee at every meal! Where is it?!" And I informed her that our coffee machine was broken. Rude daughter rolls her eyes at me and says, "Yeah, right." and demands to see the RN... because clearly, we CNA's weren't paying attention in class when the teacher instructed us on how to fix coffee makers.

So I went to the kitchen, unplugged the coffee maker, brought some ground coffee, and brought it to the patient's room. I demonstrated to her that it was broken, and she shut up.

It's funny that people think how through sheer assertiveness, the coffee machine will magically get fixed, or that soda would magically appear in the kitchen.

I wonder what she put on the survey. It was probably about me and the RN, and how we suck at fixing coffee makers.

Why did you unplug the machine?

Why not let her know that you have put in work orders for the machine to be fixed and that coffee can be had from the cafeteria or gift shop in the meantime if the dtr would be willing to go get it, and go on about how terribly sorry you are that you can't leave to go it yourself due to having other patients on the bedpans and having to get others ready for surgery and so on?

By just saying the machine is broken, you demonstrate no concern for the patient's coffee desires and need for caffeine to prevent caffeine withdrawal horrible headaches, which maybe you have never experienced.

And if there really is an order, make the kitchen send the coffee - either in big containers or on each tray - or both. Show some caring and common sense and treat people as you'd like to be treated. Sorry if I sound harsh, you just sound like you really don't care and like you think a person who is hospitalized and her dtr who is worried and concerned and feeling rather helpless on this foreign turf should just accept that the machine is broken.

I know you have tons of other work to do, but so much of pt care is using good psychology and demonstrating care, concern, and compassion. Work smart.

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I am switching from LTC to Case Management and one of my (many) floor managers said to me, "case management is NOT nursing." Like being a waitress and punching bag is. C'mon!

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Why did you unplug the machine?

Why not let her know that you have put in work orders for the machine to be fixed and that coffee can be had from the cafeteria or gift shop in the meantime if the dtr would be willing to go get it, and go on about how terribly sorry you are that you can't leave to go it yourself due to having other patients on the bedpans and having to get others ready for surgery and so on?

By just saying the machine is broken, you demonstrate no concern for the patient's coffee desires and need for caffeine to prevent caffeine withdrawal horrible headaches, which maybe you have never experienced.

And if there really is an order, make the kitchen send the coffee - either in big containers or on each tray - or both. Show some caring and common sense and treat people as you'd like to be treated. Sorry if I sound harsh, you just sound like you really don't care and like you think a person who is hospitalized and her dtr who is worried and concerned and feeling rather helpless on this foreign turf should just accept that the machine is broken.

I know you have tons of other work to do, but so much of pt care is using good psychology and demonstrating care, concern, and compassion. Work smart.

Why didn't the lady just march her butt down to the cafeteria or vending area and get coffee for her mother?

Better yet, why didn't she call before she came to see if there was anything her mother wanted? If my beloved mother were in the hospital and I knew she loved coffee, I would probably stop somewhere (Starbucks?) and bring her favorite coffee that I know the hospital wouldn't have.

WHERE and HOW did this entitlement mentality at the hospital begin? It's absurd!

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I had a patient ask me for some take out menus. I'm just a student, she was on a regular diet, and she said it like it was a well known fact so I asked the primary nurse where I could find them. A doctor nearby overheard and he almost blew a gasket! Pt was not happy with me, but she did get a visitor to bring her some Burger King.

FWIW, the cafeteria food is awesome. It's part of the reason I look forward to clinical days. I don't know what her problem was!

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