Are Nurses in Danger

Hello,

Our facility last nite was faced with a patient with probably active TB (2 out of 3 afb positivie) who wanted to go outside to smoke. (isn't that another thread???). anyway, he also was 'sick of being in his room' and wanted to walk in the hallway. If he couldn't he was going to sign out AMA. Now, in most cased when the nurses where i work hear AMA they nearly jump for joy...as it is usually a drug seeker who isn't happy with their regimen. In this case not only were they worried about their exposure but also the public health risk. The attending of course was extremely helpful and just told the nurses to not let him go and call security if he tried to leave . However, this patient is competent and is just unforunatley lacking good judgement.

So what was the outcome?? A conversation asking the patient how he would feel if someone with a communicable disease put his family at risk? As well, the patient was told that if he left (and he certainly could) the police would be called and he would be arreseted as a public health risk and placed in the jail while final test results were pending. (I never knew this was an option until the ID doc was called.) As a result...he decided to stay.

Often i think the bedside nurse is the 'frontline' with violent patients. Everything will also end up in his/her lap usually as it is about to hit the fan. I would never put myself in harms way with a violent patient....years ago when i thought i could fix most anything i would. But not anymore. In my role now i have to respond to any patient who is out of control. Thankfully i am escorted by security. Howver, this too has problems in that the security guards often make an elderly violent person more confused and paranoid.

Well, 2 nurses in Toronto died from looking after patients during the SARS outbreak here and several were sick.... Communicable diseases are a part of life, but I don't worry about them as long as I know I am following precautions. As far as physical violence goes, it does happen. Mostly from angry patients or family members, but it isn't an everyday thing.

Well, so far I've been exposed to Hep C, TB (at least twice), meningitis, and some dude that no one could figure out what he had, and these are the ones I know about. I would hate to be swabbed for MRSA, because I'm quite sure I would turn up positive on a nasal culture.

The good news is I've never contracted anything. I think a little luck mixed in with a healthy immune system will keep you from catching anything too terrible. Admittedly, I completely freaked out from the Hep C exposure, but when I started reading stats on conversion rates, I learned that my chances were extremely low.

Try and look at it this way...you're chances of dying in a car accident are far higher than from anything you may catch in the hospital, but I doubt that will keep you from driving.

You're thinking too much:kiss . It is pretty common to (in your mind) contract every disease known to God an man when in school.

The truth though is that a normal healthy person with a normal immune system doesn't get sick often.

In fact the more exposure you have the stronger you immunity is.

You will eventually take it all in stride.

As far as violence goes that is a threat on any job and even no job at all. The biggest threat is in ER. Keep in mind though that the security guards usually have a heavy presence in ER for this reason. Relax you will be fine and survive this in good health.

Hi prairiegirl,

The key to being safe against the diseases you will be working with is the use of universal precautions!! You may catch more colds or viruses the first year or so, but after that your immune system will fight them bad boys!!!

Hope that helped.

Originally posted by mjlrn97

My immune system has become so strong from years of working in hospitals and nursing homes that it has been known to attack squirrels in the front yard.

ROTFLMAO !!!!:rotfl: :chuckle :roll

I have fibromyalgia so I tend to take a few extra precautions. I am absolutely anal about hand washing and wearing a mask if I know someone is actively ill. What drives me buggy is the employees that come in to work ill and do not wear masks they are the ones that get me sick. Not there fault either since administeration discourage call offs. So much for the care in healthcare. But still all in all with general precautions and good hand washing plus a good vitamin I seem to do pretty well.

You'll feel better when Micro is over. That course gives everyone the heebie jeebies I think. :chuckle

Currently we have a lot of MRSA going around the hospital. Our entire CCU/ICU units RNs, Docs, RTs, Lab etc had to have nasal cultures done...We'll see what happens when we get the results back...

I got slapped around last week by an elderly lady. I once talked a patient into handing over his knife that he was keeping for "safety". But it is the MRSA and Hep C that really scares me. And as for universal precautions- Well nothing is fullproof. Like when a new admit patient coughs in my face-how do I know they don't have MRSA in their sputum? Or when you are cleaning a stool incontinent patient. What happens if a little bit of stool gets past your glove and you have a small skin abrasion you weren't aware of- and this patient has undiagnosed Hep-C. Yes the chances of you getting it our very slight- but how did all our patients get their C-diff, MRSA, and other nasties? Not every one of them can be explained. Scares me- but I try not to ponder it too much and always use standard precautions.

I had to smile when I read your post because it seems all of us get paranoid when we hear or read about certain conditions. You will witness this phenomenon all thru nursing school. As to your question, I don't worry. I use universal precautions and wear a mask whenever I feel it necessary, regardless of whether the patient is in isolation. If I feel it is necessary, I wear it. I keep gloves in my labcoat in case I am not close to a box of them when I need them. I have gotten ill only once due to a patient and it was MY fault. He was an infant with Rotavirus and was too cute for words so I had to give him a hug. Too close for comfort, as it turned out.