I am so upset. I need to vent. I had an incident this past week while we were having one of those nightmare evenings in triage. Had parent bring a child in with a high fever so I triaged the child, had him checked in, and got a fever reducer to give the child. The child vomited while being given the med, which made me laugh when everyone in the immediate vicinity got tagged with the vomit. Well, long story short, the parents didn't like me laughing, and expressed it, I apologized and told them that I meant no disrespect, but the parents proceeded to totally blow up and become loud and beligerent, yelling and screaming at everyone in the immediate vicinity. Well, I was rattled, needless to say, and things went from bad to worse. Security was called to come and try and calm things down. The security officer proceeded to wander out to the area, and when I asked him to help me, he replied that he was needed in back. He immediately left, and went to the charge nurse and told her that SHE needed to go out to triage, that HE didn't want to get in the middle of things out there. She came out and tried to talk to the mom, the house supervisor tried to talk to the mom, and no one was able to calm this woman down. She continued to scream and yell and demand to talk to the "highest" she could talk to. I know I didn't handle things right, I got upset and showed it. Not good, but with the waiting room FULL, and people continuing to come in and wanting to see the doctor, what I needed was more rooms, more doctors, and someone to do crowd control. None of which I had. At one point the dad looked at me and called me a "f@#$%&* b@#$%$! When he said that, the charge nurse told me that the dad was not to come back when we finally got a room for the kid. So when time came for the child to go back, I told another security officer that dad was not allowed back because he had been abusive to staff. Course, mom got taken back but threw a fit until they finally agreed to let dad be escorted back by security if he behaved. I know I handled things badly; we were so busy, it was one of those shifts from hell. I didn't allow the dad to go back, then the grandma asked to go back and we were so busy I said no, which was wrong, in hindsight. Ok, so this did turn into a long story, sorry. Now, the reason I am upset, this morning I was called into the office with the manager and the head of the department. I had already told the manager what had happened, and so did the charge nurse. The charge nurse told the manager that she didn't feel that I was inappropriate, and that the mom and dad were way out of line, so the manager wasn't just hitting me with this from the parent's point of view. Anyway, my manager called the mom to get her side of the story; the mom told her that, yes, she behaved inappropriately, but felt like I didn't care about her sick child, (despite the fact that I had obtained a fever reducer, and I had advised her things to do to help bring down the fever) and that she felt intimidated by security being called on them. In questioning the security officer, he told my manager that I was acting inappropriately and probably escalated the situation. (This security officer is well known for being a wimp, when it comes to handling crisis situations, we all know we can't count on him if things go bad) The outcome on this was that my manager told me that I handled the situation wrong, which I agreed, and the head of the department which was also in the meeting, told me that a) I shouldn't have called security to use them as an intimidation tactic, and b) as long as the dad wasn't physically threatening me that I should have just let the dad back, and not called security to come and help intimidate the dad and mom into behaving. I told the director that in hindsight, I would have preferred that the dad be escorted from the building since he was being verbally abusive to me, and I felt threatened by it, but he told me that as long as the dad wasn't physically threatening me, that he wasn't being abusive and I should have just let him back, and allowed him to cuss at me and call me foul names. I feel that, yes, I handled the situation wrong, I know it, but I also feel that to be told that I have to allow people to cuss at me and not be allowed to call security to stand by as an added incentive for people to not get out of control was just too much. I can handle being chastised for behaving badly, I deserved it, but to be told that I had to take abuse from patients and families....I still can't believe it! Oh and by the way, this is one of those hospitals that swear by the Press Gainey so I guess patient satisfaction is more important that making staff feel that they are safe when they work. I would like honest feedback, am I wrong to expect not to allow people to verbally harrass me? Am I wrong to call security to help control crowds by their presence in triage? Oh BTW, there are only two night shift security guards (and a lot of the staff has complained about them), that don't think that it is their job to help with agitated individuals, the rest of them, have no problem making sure the staff feels safe where we work. Thanks for listening to my vent.
