I got a call from my DON this morning...said he heard back from the corporate nurse. Said she asked him if he would have done anything different than I did in caring for this patient, and he now says he told her "no" - after railing at me yesterday about "being the better person", after telling me it was out of his hands, and after the ADON pointing out all the facility paperwork that I didn't get completed, even though all the info was in my notes. Then, two hours later the staffing coordinator called to see if I'd work a shift today, even though it's my day off! GAG!
I'm scheduled to work tomorrow morning, and I'm taking my two-weeks' notice with me. We are travelling overseas to get our adopted daughters in four weeks, so I probably won't be able to find another job right away - I don't think anyone would hire me knowing that I'm going to have to be off work for four-five weeks. I will go back to a hospital environment, too, even if I have to be an aide...I've only got about 8-9 more months of study with Excelsior before I can sit for the NCLEX-RN, and I've just got to keep my license until then.
Thank you all for sharing...and caring.
The temporary suspension without pay is a facility policy, and the only work I missed was scheduled overtime anyway, so I'm just going to drop that issue.
I searched online last night for malpractice insurance, and found some, so I'm taking care of that later today. I don't know what the deal was with the other company, and I don't even remember their name.
My husband (my biggest fan) kept telling me there was no way this accusation could come to anything. But I still feel my instructors standing behind me, if you know what I mean, when I'm doing procedures and giving meds (not that they terrorized us, they were nice and helpful), and I sooo want to be good at this, but I get our quarterly BON newsletter and see pages and pages of nurses' names/license numbers who've been disciplined one way or another, and I could just see the last two years being a total waste.
Anyway, thanks a million to everyone who shared! I'm definitely wiser from this whole mess, and I have survived, so I'm pushing on...
I've been a licensed nurse for a whole year now, working in a long-term care facility on their medical specialty unit. I just found out that a resident I took care of earlier this week has filed a complaint against me, alleging abuse. He's a very difficult patient, and there is a lot of documentation in his chart to prove it, besides my notes, but the DON's only advice to me at this point was that "we have to be the better person" when dealing with these impossible people. So, it sounds to me like I'm going to fry...probably the shortest nursing career in history...although I did all I could, as far as I can tell, without risking physical injury - I took lots of verbal crap from the resident every time I took care of him being called names I hadn't ever heard before... Any advice from anyone? Do I just surrender my license, or wait to see how things play out... I've never faced anything like this before - most people would say I'm a pretty smart, careful, loving person, and we're in the middle of adopting two international orphans, so I obviously have some redeeming qualities... I just don't know what to think about this. I was warned that this DON didn't support his nurses...I guess I'm finding out the BIG way how true it is... Thanks for listening...
