Thank you notes to patients?

[darkblue]

Hey there, our ER manager is making all the employees write thank you notes to our patients thanking them for allowing us to take care of them.

This seems a little odd to me, I thought it was supposed to be the other way around. Do any of you practice this?

[slmnewrn07]

We had a similar practice at my hospital, called scripting. We had to thank our patient at the end of day for deciding to come to our hospital. As we were saying it, you could hear other patients and there families in other rooms laughing at us, we sounded like trained robots, lol. The idea didnt last very long.

[Betterdays]

Yes, my last workplace (hospital) does the same...fairly plain, preprinted thank you notes that each RN assigned to the pt must sign (additional salutations are encouraged). This is then given to the pt with their discharge instructions regardless of the circumstances. The little old Grannies love it! Some of our general pt population seem to appreciate it, sort of. Most of the 20-40 yr old pts take it as a joke.

Like we don't have enough to worry about...lets add one more insignificant thing to the list!! Why couldn't they have volunteers doing this for hospital relations with the community. Nurses are busy enough!

[ArwenEvenstar]

Nurses having to write thank you notes to the patients?? Scripting?? Reading all these responses has made me feel disgusted. I don't curse, but I feel like using some expletives. I left the hospital setting almost 4 yrs ago now....This confirms i will NEVER go back. Never.

What about the nurses getting thanked for all their hard work??? I've been a nurse about 17 years. In the early years of my career it was very common for the patients to thank the nurses after discharge with nice thank you notes AND bringing gifts like chocolates. Often they would bring separate boxes of chocolates for each shift. I'd say a good 50% of the patients did this. However, the last few years before I left the hospital setting, this seemed to be getting less and less common. I'd say maybe only 5 - 10 % of the patients did this. AND NOW - the NURSES have to THANK the patients????!!!!!!

Things are ass backward!!!!!!!!!!!! Hope I am allowed to say that....

[AirforceRN, RN]

How about prior to discharge the pts are required to write and sign thank you notes to the nurses? We don't need individual ones...just one for the group.

Afterwards, the nurses can sign a thank you note to the patient thanking them for taking the time to thank the nurses.

Together we can encourage the destruction of our virgin forests one useless note at a time.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

How about prior to discharge the pts are required to write and sign thank you notes to the nurses? We don't need individual ones...just one for the group.

Afterwards, the nurses can sign a thank you note to the patient thanking them for taking the time to thank the nurses.

Together we can encourage the destruction of our virgin forests one useless note at a time.

And isn't that what customer service is all about, destroying trees? Between our thank you notes, and the surveys, and the survey reports and the write-ups of the nurses for bad surveys....

[woknblues]

I work in Outpatient Surgery and we do send out cards to the patients. They are not "thank you" cards so much as they are a little pre-printed message that says we hope they are feeling better and gives a phone number to call if they have questions or comments. I actually like the cards because some of the staff like to write little messages to the patients. They are NOT mandatory to sign and only the staff actually caring for the patient sign the cards. I think it is cheesy for each person to sign. That makes it seem like an office birthday card.

I have received phone calls from sending out these cards because the patients really appreciate them. I think post-op patients are usually in a confused state of mind when they leave and so it is nice for them to get a card a couple of days later so they can remember who cared for them and have a phone number to call if they have questions.

As far as ER goes...I just don't see how it would be feasible to send hand written cards to all your patients. Your patient volume is too high for one thing.

Maybe your manager has shares in Hallmark?

This is what I would envision if I had to do it myself.

As a family member of patients, I always went out and got a thank you card for the staff. (This was way prior to entering the field). This way does seem a little backwards to me.

Anyone can see that nurses and hospital staff work harder and in more unpleasant situations than nearly anyone, and are deserving of thanks.

I guess as a joke, it shouldn't be taken poorly, and I can see that some people might actually like one. Of course, hospitals are big business, so I can't see how this comes as a big shock.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

I was thinking, in other customer service jobs, they don't write thank you notes, in fact, tipping is expected. If this is the direction we're going, then we need to go all the way and put a tip jar at the nurses station.

[Riseupandnurse]

Yes, I've always thought no=one will be happy until nurses quit getting paid a wage at all and work only for tips. Imagine the savings to the hospital and the great Press Ganey scores!! A win-win for everyone. And nothing left to lose, since nurses have lost any genuine feelings for their patients or ability to relate to them without scripting, or so the Struder Group thinks.

[november17, ASN, RN]

We write thank you notes as well. Some of my coworkers sign all of them. I only sign the ones of people where I was involved in their care.