Ok, I recently started a new job. I am still orienting and at least 3 nurses now have warned me about Dr X. Apparently he cusses out the nurses, berates them, screams in their face, and often hangs up on them if they call him at night when he is ON CALL. He tells the patients they ( the nurses) are incompetent and blames them for his mistakes. I have yet to have any interaction with this man, but working on this floor I will at some point. He has been doing this for over 4 years, and in that time 2 nurses have been fired for talking back to him. Administration does nothing, and he is free to rant as he pleases.
I speak up, if this man ever yells in my face I am prob going to get canned. I can't believe this man gets away with this. Any advice on how to handle him? I honestly do not even think I can keep quiet if I see him doing this to someone else.
I am thinking nurses need to start documenting this. But obviously the admins are aware of his behavior.
Unfortunately, disrespect like this happens often. I had a Dr. yell at me and disrespect me over lab results. When have you ever heard of a nurse reporting only the normal values. As I sat very quiet like a church mouse...lol! I waited and I waited for him to finish and said "Dr. I just wanted to inform you that this conversation was recorded for training purposes and I will remember next time to only report the normals." Ha Ha Ha! The next time I spoke with this Dr. he used the manners his mother taught him, thank you and your welcome. LVN 1 Dr. 0
Doctor tantrums don't bother me because they are just infantile tantrums. If a doctor goes on a tirade on the phone I speak over him to let him know I am hanging up and then do so. If they hang up on me, that's the best, because then you get to chart for the MD communication that the DR "hung up without giving orders."
Incident reports won't do anything. If you have a good manager, they will support you, but that MD will still work there and probably still act the same, especially if they bring in big money to the hospital.
Just don't let it bother you. Never let the rants of an over-worked, under-slept, megalomaniac bother you.
Now if it actually harms the patient, write that up and go all the way up the chain of command to advocate for your patient. All the other stuff is just fluff.
The physicians at the facility I work at get away with EVERYTHING!!!! Filing incident reports is wasted time. They even refuse to follow the CMS core measures, and administration just slaps them on the wrist. Quality gets in trouble for the poor scores, not the physicians. It makes me sick, because we actually have some crappy doctors, and they think they are gods.
I figure after 30 years in this business, I can give a little of their own medicine back at them. It takes them by surprise, knocks them off balance because they don't expect it and evens the playing field! I will not be treated like dirt!!
Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
demonstrate some self-respect. if he does this to you, in public or in private, tell him you will not stand there and listen to abuse. if he starts doing it to anyone else, immediately go and stand beside her. say this even if he is screaming, don't give him the respect he thinks he deserves by waiting for him to finish. then turn and leave (and if you are supporting someone else, take her too) as he is in mid-tantrum. if he so much as lays a finger on you, walk directly to the phone and call police (not hospital security).
i can promise you that your hospital risk management officer is interested in your incident reports-- see that they arrive directly to that desk, even if you have to make a copy, because sometimes they get "lost." the risk mgmt literature is full of articles about how a staffer like this is a liability to the institution and ways to deal with it.
i once did this with a doctor who was reaming out a co-worker. he had a reputation of being sloppy with his orders. my co-worker interpreted an order differently from what he wanted. as he was yelling at her, i read the order and came up with the same conclusion she did. so i said, "well, i just read the order and interpreted it the same way." he looked at me and yelled, "it's not your responsibility to interpret orders. it's for responsibility to do what the orders say." so i said, "well, you're wrong. it is my responsibility to interpret orders physicians write. maybe if you didn't write bad orders, there wouldn't be so much confusion over what you want."
after he left we wrote him up...together. i would rather die than have that man lay a finger on me to help me if i needed it.
Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
Yes, and I imagine he also drives a big truck.
A lot of nurses actually cry when he does this. Its ridiculous! All of the nurses have told me if he gives orders, write them down word for word and have the charge nurse verify them because he also blames nursing when something goes wrong and claims to have never said what he said.
What's cool now is most people have a cell phone on them, so when these jerks go on a tear, people can just whip out their phones, tape it, then post it to YouTube.
Not that I am suggesting we actually do this, because that might be perceived as "unprofessional."
What's cool now is most people have a cell phone on them, so when these jerks go on a tear, people can just whip out their phones, tape it, then post it to YouTube.Not that I am suggesting we actually do this, because that might be perceived as "unprofessional."
Hello all, I'm reaching out here... has anyone been the victim of "behind the scenes" bullying by a physician? I only worked for this MD ten weeks (she fired me, or I should say she had the office manager fire me for her, which honestly was a relief !) but it was ten weeks of hell. This physician is LOVED by nearly all of her patients, has her own practice, a very small core staff. I was "warned" by her staff that she could be difficult, but never in my eighteen years as an RN have I endured such mental / emotional turmoil. She was very nice to me when she interviewed me, but soon as I was on her clock, the claws came out. I was hired to replace her prior RN, who left after just over a year (? wonder why). While this MD wasn't an outright yeller or loose cannon, she was very , well, just mean to me, making comments like, "oh, you aren't writing this down... I will wait for you to take notes as you obviously don't retain anything" I could give more details, but this is already getting long. Let me put it this way... it felt like I was working with a DIVA actress, you know, the type that berates all of her staff, then goes onstage as a different person. I almost wish she was a consistent bully, to everyone i.e. her patients, so I wouldn't feel so confused. Hope this makes sense. Oh, and the reason I was let go, I kid you not, is that I was "too nice to the patients, took too long on phone with them, and Dr. xxxxx wants to be the nice one". Guess she wanted her nurse to be the "bad guy". I am a good nurse. I took this job because I left the GI clinic I worked for after nearly 12 years because I wanted to move to part time work in a smaller clinic so I could return to school (this is another long story , I'll spare the details) But I always had good performance reviews from the physicians there. Oh well. Any validation or reality check is appreciated! Meantime I am recovering from that mental Chinese Water Torture!
blessednurse12
2 Posts
Unfortunately, disrespect like this happens often. I had a Dr. yell at me and disrespect me over lab results. When have you ever heard of a nurse reporting only the normal values. As I sat very quiet like a church mouse...lol! I waited and I waited for him to finish and said "Dr. I just wanted to inform you that this conversation was recorded for training purposes and I will remember next time to only report the normals." Ha Ha Ha! The next time I spoke with this Dr. he used the manners his mother taught him, thank you and your welcome. LVN 1 Dr. 0