Anyone else feel like a robot reciting customer service scripts all the time?

serenity1 · Dec 14, 2011

Yep....hate it. Getting out of the hospital setting as soon as I get enough education to move on to something else. We actually have to call patients 1-2 days after discharge and survey them. This is on top of the mailed survey. There can be upwards of 40+ calls daily. What RN do you know has this kind of time in their day? Has to be an RN in case the patient asks questions.

awheat · Dec 14, 2011

We spend umpteen hours in school learning that each patient is different and that we must embrace/work with such diversity by tailor-crafting our care plan to meet them on their turf...then must recite a script identically to each patient...really!! Who thinks up this stuff? "Is there anything else I can do for you? I have the time." - NOT

Tait, MSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

I remember sitting in a communications class a million years ago and practicing "reflection". I felt so stupid doing it. It felt fake, and insincere. Years later, and with lots of practice integrating it into my conversational style with my patients, I realized...it worked.

KelRN215, BSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

The whole customer service idea is silly IMO. It's not that I don't want my patients to be entirely happy with their stay and if I have time then I will absolutely round and see if I can get my patients anything. The problem is that patients don't usually understand prioritization, so they don't understand that my inability to bring them a pitcher of water may be because I have a patient currently in respiratory distress who I have to tend to. It also leads patients to think we are waitresses, IMO. The other day I was leaving work and some man came up to me and asked me where he could get a cup of coffee. I nicely explained to him that the cafeteria was closed, but that there is a nice coffee shop right across the street. He subsequently got annoyed and told me that he was too overweight to walk across the street, and would I be able to get him a cup of coffee from the cafeteria (keep in mind that I wasn't on my unit anymore, was off work, and this man was a stranger to me). I repeated that the cafeteria was closed, and he scoffed off annoyed that I couldn't make a cup off coffee appear out of thin air. I also had a parent yell at me for 15 minutes because "food services continues to bring up food that a toddler will not eat" (ie barbeque chicken and green beans), I asked her what her son likes and she replied "hamburgers and french fries". I had to explain to her that food services does not serve that, and her son was on a sodium restricted diet so shouldn't have that anyways. She clearly wasn't "satisfied" with my response. I am here to be a nurse, and promote good health. Sometimes reality is not what patients/families want to hear, and that is going to contribute to lower patient satisfaction surveys. I'm very blunt with my patients and if I have a higher priority to deal with then I tell them, most people understand after that but unfortunately some still don't. I agree with the OP that we should focus on clinical outcomes more than patient satisfaction surveys. Wouldn't it be nice to be handed a nurse satisfaction survey and have management do rounds to ask if there is anything WE need?

I remember when I was in nursing school, someone who I know personally whose child has several chronic illnesses told me that she could sympathize with the nurses when she was in the hospital with her daughter because she used to be a waitress and she felt there were similarities between nursing and waitressing "because you're on the front line". At the time, I found the comparison a little insulting but I kind of got it when she explained that "you get blamed for things you can't control." I fully understood what she meant after I actually started working as a nurse and only a few months off orientation, I had a father yell at me non-stop because he was mad that his child was NPO and on-call for the OR. Because yelling at ME on the floor is really going to speed up the surgery that your child's surgeon is currently performing. People are ridiculous sometimes... no one would ever want to think that their child's surgeon rushed his case because he had another case waiting to be called in but when they're the ones waiting, that's basically exactly what they expect to happen.

My hospital sends out satisfaction surveys to patients routinely. Then all the complaints get posted in the back room with signs telling us how good it is to get this feedback. The complaints are usually things like, "we waited too long in the ER" or "you should have more channels on the TV." Yup, those are completely relevant to nursing on the floor.

I've filled out many a nurse satisfaction survey before. If management doesn't like the results, they are swept under the rug. It's a magnet requirement to participate in national surveys... unfortunately it's not a requirement to share the results or do anything because of them.

applewhitern, BSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

Yes, I have noticed the patient's complaints are rarely about the nurses, but we get blamed anyway. What I hear most is complaints about the food, NPO status, the wait for doctors to round, stuff I can't do anything about. We have to call the patients at home after discharge also, but our LPNs do this, not the RNs. I wouldn't care what they complained about as long as it was directed by management to the proper personnel involved. Why is it my fault the doctor hasn't rounded yet, or that the food in inferior? But only the nurses get chewed out by management.

anotherone, BSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

i feel more like an idiot and bad actress when using the scripts. i have worked for companies that did indeed believe if you used what ever the highest mark was on the survey, in your example "very good" that would brainwash the patients into choosing it.

FlyingScot, RN · Dec 14, 2011

Hate them, hate them, hate them! We got laminated cards we were supposed to use. I think the original intent was for us to memorize them. I chose the evil employee route. I would take them out and hold them up to my face and read them to the patient with as little inflection as possible. What could they say, I was following the letter of the law. My patients would crack up!!

psu_213, BSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

At my first job, on a different unit in the hospital, they had to always answer the phone with "Good morning/afternoon/etc., it is an excellent day on (unit name), how may I help you?" Management on the unit may no attempt to hide the fact they people were to say that so pts, family members, etc. would think 'excellent' when completing their customer service evals. :uhoh3:

PMFB-RN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

I don't play that stupid game. When the tried it at my last hospital I told them I MIGHT condider it when I saw the neuro, ortho & CV surgeons reciting the script. Then I walked out of the meeting and dropped my scripting card in the trash. Several older nurses did the same and it all came to nothing. It was easy for me to do as I was just casual at that hospital and didn't need the job to make a living. Even if I did I still would follow the stupid script but I might not have left in such a dramatic fashion.

KelRN215, BSN, RN · Dec 14, 2011

This thread is seriously making me think of all the lines I've been fed by the powers that be in my institution lately. Not a single doubt in my mind that they're scripted.

"Happy to discuss more if needed."

"My door is always open."

"The hospital always errs on the employees' side."

Then when you actually try to discuss further, they get all defensive and get mad at you for even raising a question. I thought you were "happy to discuss" this with me? Yeah, that's what I thought....

rntj · Dec 14, 2011

Yes, as some of you have figured out, I do work at a "magnet" hospital. What a joke! I have refused to "manage up" the doctors. I don't know the frickin doctors, I work at night. I will say nice stuff about my fellow staff members, because I work with them, I know what they're like and the care they provide. And don't even get me started on the hourly rounding! I'd like to suckerpunch whoever came up with that. Yes, I have endless amounts of time for all these things, yet I hold sick people's lives in my hand. Let' get our priorities straight here! It sure does make me feel like a waitress (which I did briefly) and IMO totally goes against this "professional" image nursing is trying to convey.

3PRN · Dec 15, 2011

When I was told that I must say (to EVERY patient) "I'm going to close the curtain now to ensure your privacy"....I nearly gagged! Of course I'm closing the curtain to ensure their privacy, but I REFUSE to announce it! If you haven't, please refer to the book 1984 and read up on Newspeak.