I'm wondering - have any of you gone through either the AIDET or the Disney "customer service" training/in-services?
If so, what were your feelings about them? (I sat through an AIDET in-service that made me queasy - I agree we should be nice to people, but the WAY it was presented was so condescending and info-mercialish.)
And did you think they were expending energy in the wrong place, as opposed to trying to tackle other, much more salient problems in patient care, such as poor nurse-patient ratios?
The customer service emphasis seems ominous to me, since it seems to place even more burden on the nurse, while ignoring the fact that if nursing units were better staffed, then a "customer service" mentality would occur more naturally anyway, since nurses wouldn't be running around like so many beheaded chickens.
There also seems to be a growing impression that hospitals are more like "hospitality houses" as opposed to places you go to in order to get your medical problem treated or stablized.
So, on the one hand we have understaffing and frazzled nurses, and, on the other, a contradictory expectation that those understaffed, frazzled nurses should be even MORE customer-friendly, despite their understaffing. It doesn't make sense to me.
I am not an active nurse yet, so I could have a wrong impression. But that AIDET in-service did NOT sit well with me, especially if it is an omen of things to come.
Or is it that EVERYONE is less customer-friendly these days, and we all need a reminder of what it is to act civilly? I don't know. But the reminder should come in a manner that assumes we are adults, not children.
