Having No Empathy For Certain Residents

Nurses General Nursing

Published

Specializes in LTC.

Sounds bad, but it's true. I was reflecting on past residents, particularly the ones that made providing adequate nursing care a nearly insurmountable personal challenge. Case in point:

I had charge of a 60-something convicted child molester who was very sexually behaviored. He would roll himself out into the hall with nothing covering his genitals and would try to get staff/residents/visitors, anything with eyes to look at his member. When redirected and told his behavior was unacceptable, he'd giggle like a small child with a gleeful look on his disgusting face. Of course we'd chart, report, etc., but no other facility on the planet would take him so we were stuck with him. Medication and therapy were categorically ineffective. (Maybe they should have tried a lobotomy...)

Anytime a child was in the facility we were all on high alert because he would, without fail, beeline to said child like a moth to the light and say all kinds of repulsive things if we didn't 1:1 him when children were around. Again, he would just giggle and smirk and...grrrrr....

Because of his behavior, I found that having to be his nurse to have been one of the biggest challenges of my career thus far because I truly didn't give one pile of feces if he drew another breath or not. In fact, I hoped each of his next breaths would be his last. But because of the ethics of this profession, I was bound by those ethics to provide quality nursing care as much as I loathed to do so. It was a profound emotional struggle to "care" for him. It almost felt as though I were betraying society by doing so.

Have any of you had similar experiences? How did you handle them?

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Specializes in ER.

Of course. Some people are despicable. Becoming a nurse doesn't mean you have to really care about patients. You just have to be professional. Sainthood is optional.

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Specializes in Hospice.

The dilemma of having to provide care to the truly vile in our society is ongoing. Can you imagine how the ER nurses felt when Richard Speck was brought in having the heart attack that ultimately killed him?

All sex offenders have to be registered. They all have rules to follow. Child molesters are generally required to be a certain number of feet away from children. Willful disregard of those rules on his part should mean a quick trip back to jail. You don't have to put up with his antics. A phone call to his parole officer or the local police should take care of it.

Don't forget, you have other patients (and those children who are visiting) that you have a responsibility to as well, and if the perv won't play nice, then all bets are off.

He's not going to change (the recidivist rate for child molesters is pretty high), and he knows that he has the upper hand because there have been no consequences. They are masters at knowing just how far they can push things, and he's figured out he can push them pretty far.

Make the phone call, get him the Hell out of there, and get him on your "do not readmit" list. The general public can check the state sex offender lists to see how many offenders are in their area, and where they reside. I would automatically check it if I had a loved one in a facility. The facility is also supposed to provide that information, if anyone asks (and signs stating that are posted prominently).

You really don't want a family to go to the media because a sex offender isn't being reined in.

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Specializes in critical care, ER,ICU, CVSURG, CCU.

Yes, and it is an effort, bless you

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Specializes in LTC.
The dilemma of having to provide care to the truly vile in our society is ongoing. Can you imagine how the ER nurses felt when Richard Speck was brought in having the heart attack that ultimately killed him?

All sex offenders have to be registered. They all have rules to follow. Child molesters are generally required to be a certain number of feet away from children. Willful disregard of those rules on his part should mean a quick trip back to jail. You don't have to put up with his antics. A phone call to his parole officer or the local police should take care of it.

Don't forget, you have other patients (and those children who are visiting) that you have a responsibility to as well, and if the perv won't play nice, then all bets are off.

He's not going to change (the recidivist rate for child molesters is pretty high), and he knows that he has the upper hand because there have been no consequences. They are masters at knowing just how far they can push things, and he's figured out he can push them pretty far.

Make the phone call, get him the Hell out of there, and get him on your "do not readmit" list. The general public can check the state sex offender lists to see how many offenders are in their area, and where they reside. I would automatically check it if I had a loved one in a facility. The facility is also supposed to provide that information, if anyone asks (and signs stating that are posted prominently).

You really don't want a family to go to the media because a sex offender isn't being reined in.

This was a few years ago. I was just reflecting on some of the more difficult moments in my career. The individual I was referring to did not register as ordered for several years as we found out, and my DON reported him hoping to get rid of him. His parole officer came to the facility, scolded him, took his pic and registered him at the facility address. The authorities did nothing.

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This, admittedly, would have been difficult for me. You are here by deemed Saint for that alone in my book. I have a particular sour taste for those lot. It's one of my many worst nightmares. I know that I would not be able to separate emotions and professionalism in that case. There is also another area of nursing that I'd be too emotionally invested in and that is addiction. I thought I needed to face my fears and work in that type of facility but I realize now that it wouldn't be in my best interest nor the patients.

I did have to care for a racist old fellow once. You could tell he was quite the trouble maker back in his hay day. I was able to provide care though some very unprofessional thoughts crossed my mind. In the middle of his stories of the 'good ole days' I realized that I actually didn't care one bit about his prattlings and forgot about him til now lol.

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Specializes in PACU, ED.

I work at a teaching hospital so was thinking about a different type of resident, MD.

However, I had a toddler recovering from surgery a week ago. He was giggling, smiling, and eating a Popsicle. I called anesthesia to get sign out. The doc said he'd swing by in a few minutes. Then the child noticed the IV in his foot.

He screamed bloody murder in Spanish. Knowing he was going home I d/c the IV but he continued to cry about the bandage. That is when my doc walked up and asked if the child was hurting. It took a few minutes between my broken Spanish and the parents' broken English to convince the doc that the child was fine other than hating anything medical on his body. Never trust a three year old!

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Pretty of patients I don't like and many who I think are just a waste of oxygen. However, at the ed of the day I just do my job per its requirements. That's just being professional. I don't REALLY have to care of like any of them. That's not in the job description.

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My phone is terrible...

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I didn't much care for the woman who would give me the most hateful glare, saying nothing, when I approached her after she turned her call light on promptly at 11 pm to demand her "PRN" vicodin. She was probably one of the two most hateful residents I ever met. I wasn't there long enough to take the step myself to have the doctor change her order to routine, based on her nightly demand with no assessed indications. The other shifts didn't have her call light going off at 7 am or 4 pm, so they didn't give a care.

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Specializes in Psychiatry, Forensics, Addictions.

Yes, I have these experiences on a daily basis. Working in forensic psych, I have a unit full of pedophiles, murderers, and rapists. I tend not to get wrapped up in their crime, and treat the person. If the patient treats me with respect, then I treat them with respect regardless of their crime. If I stopped to think every minute about their crime, I would have difficulty treating them, so I don't think about it. They are a patient needing care, period. End of story.

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Doesn't matter what they did, didn't do, how despicable one would find them...

They need care. Obviously, the treatment of choice was not working. So onto something else.

Don't get so caught up in emotional distaste that you can't see the forest through the trees.

Someone that was an amazing soul for many years had a stroke. That left him so sexually inappropriate, that it was a constant battle to keep him covered, to keep him from blurting out things that would make a jaded Media star blush, and acting out in the most incredibly inappropriate ways that it was stunningly obvious what primitive stuff the brain can activate after injury to it. His wife of 62 years was so horrified. His children and grandchildren and great grandchildren could not visit--it went wayyyy beyond no filter. But I could remember him as being the kindest person with a character that was beyond dispute.

This stuff can happen after a stroke. This stuff can happen after a brain injury. This stuff can happen after someone with a developmental disability matures. This stuff can happen after trauma. This stuff can happen after abuse. This stuff can happen as a result of mental illness.

Sexual inappropriate people, pedophiles--there is a cause by which they are like they are.

So if you have to rectify yourself from your emotional response to deviant patients, I would suggest that you think a moment on these patient's conditions are the result of a disease process. Whether that disease is mental illness, TBI, or some other brain malfunction. If you had a patient that severely acted out in other ways other than sexually, same things apply.

There are many, many times that as a primary nurse one is going to encounter patients and situations that are in complete contrast to one's personal character. To one's personal belief system.

There are skilled care facilities that have locked wards that are specifically for patients who are not controlled well with treatment. That don't allow children to visit. That I did a clinical rotation on. And it just made me feel sad. Sad that society, environment, upbringing, or medical crisis creates these individuals to live the life they now do. And the saddest to me where the ones that when you looked into their eyes, even THEY were horrified...but lacked the filter or control to do anything about it.

And please be clear. I am an advocate for many things, children one of them. And I despise the lack of control on people who traumatize kids. Which includes pedophiles.

But as a nurse, we will encounter these people. And our goal is function and treatment, not the person's morals, character or lack thereof.

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