Re: OR Pet peeves
Ohh my god, so nitpicky but I work in CT and the thoracic surgeons are forever pulling tonsil sponges off on my sponge sticks to use them as ring forceps. They don't even tell me. They just drop the sponge on my mayo for me to discover when I turn back around. And I ALWAYS keep both an empty and a loaded sponge stick on the mayo at all times, just so I have both available in case my hands are tied up loading a stapler or something.
And also they like to ask for things not on their DPC, like a harmonic scalpel or ostene or local anesthetic or whatever. But if I can't produce this for them in a nanosecond, they do a work-around while the circulator is getting the item. Then, as soon as she opens it up they don't want it. So. Much. Waste.
And being treated like I'm subhuman when I circulate. We have cardiac surgeons who never say the circulator's name. It's just my job to guess from the slight change in inflection (while I'm charting, fetching, pager managing, phone-answering) that they're talking to me and not the scrub or fellow or anesthesia or perfusionist. The same docs punctuate every request with "and be quick about it." Oh, so it's not okay to get your gortex graft on the way back from a smoke break? Thanks for clearing that up."
I'm only 10 months in the OR but I plan to leave Award-Winning Teaching Hospital as soon as they pay for my CNOR. If I'm going to get treated like absolute scum every day I might as well be a travel nurse and make bank. I've worked a lot of jobs but never experienced abuse like I see it inflicted daily in the OR.
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