Because thats really gonna help

Nurses General Nursing

Published

So my hospital has had a major increase in falls in the past couple months. 3 in one week on the telemetry floor. The solution? Every 2 hour toileting. Which is supposed to be done anyway. The CHANGE from previous, that is supposed to take care of the problem. MORE CHARTING!!! They have now added having to initital every 2 hours on our flow sheet that we toileted the patient every 2 hours, in addition to the hourly rounding sign off we have to do.

I find it humorous, I really do. The fact that management apparently has their heads so far up their butts that they thing ADDING more paperwork that will take away from the time we have to spend caring for our patients, is somehow going to improve patient care. INSTEAD of actually looking at what may have contributed to the falls. Like cutting our staffing AGAIN. Lets see.. less staff= less time for each patient. Less time= increased falls and lower "client" satisfaction. But hey... whatever looks good on paper, right:rolleyes:

Specializes in Med/Surg, Neuro, ICU, travel RN, Psych.
Too bad nurses aren't offered the opportunity to visit the toilet every 2 hours. Most of us only get the chance to go once every 12 hours, if that. I'm gonna make a form for management. They will have to initial it, stating that they have checked that every nurse in the hospital has had the chance to pee every 2 hours, and to take a real uninterrupted break and lunch :) Any failures to complete the form will lead to a salary freeze.

LMAO... that is awesome!!

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Specializes in PACU, OR.

KeyMaster is quite correct; this kind of documentation is administrative butt-covering.

As for the forms themselves, sounds to me like they were dreamed by people seeking to justify their jobs...

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Specializes in LTC/Skilled Care/Rehab.

I love it LiveToLearn! Do you think they really care about us and our health? I am always worried about getting a UTI because I don't drink enough or take enough bathroom breaks. I have learned to force myself to take a break even if that means I have to stay over a little. If they complain about the overtime I will just tell them that I am taking the break I am legally allowed to take....especially since they take 30 mins from my check every day for lunch. Sorry I don't work for free!

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Specializes in floor to ICU.

I find the same issues with our "No Lift" policy. We have about a hover mat and one ErgoNurse contraption that we are supposed to use. Also, the linen carts have annoying signs on them reminding you to "empty at half full" to prevent back injuries. Funny thing is that you have to toss the linen bag into a large container that has an opening about 3 feet off the ground. You essentially have to hurl up it into the cart.:rolleyes:

Too many back injuries at my place so now they make us sign the No Lift policy. CYA for Managment. Hurt your back at work? Too bad, you didn't follow policy. Policy doesn't mention that you need to run all over the hospital looking for the hover mat or spend 20 minutes moving the furniture and bed around in order to set up the ErgoNurse.

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Specializes in Health Information Management.

Scripting is the most idiotic thing I've ever witnessed. I don't do it. They actually want us to say exactly the phrases they've created for us. To me, it sounds phony and contrived. And when someone uses scripting on me, like a waiter or a front desk clerk at a hotel, I feel like they don't care about me as an individual at all. It's so obvious that they're just repeating the same things over and over that they couldn't possibly give a rat's ass about me as an individual, right?

I couldn't agree more. Scripting is stupid and pointless, no matter who's reciting memorized lines. It annoys me when I hear it at a store, it annoys me when I hear it over the phone - but if I were in the hospital, listening to nurses recite scripted questions and comments? Let's just say it wouldn't make me feel very valued as a patient. In fact, it would make me feel like a piece of meat, to be processed and shipped out.

So help me, if I ever end up in a meeting with other paper-pushers and someone suggests scripting, I'm going to blow my top. Never mind the fact that scripting is usually suggested by a consulting firm, which of course makes God knows how much money off of pushing its idiotic little marketing/corporate brainwashing routine down everyone's throats....

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Specializes in PeriOperative.
I'm pretty sure there is a spot to check off that says we have completed the checklist.

That is the last page of my computer charting. The checklist confirmation. It will not accept my charting as valid unless it is checked. :uhoh3:

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Specializes in ER, ICU, Education.

All these things just make me laugh sometimes. So ridiculous. I could not figure out what all this nonsense reminded me of for years. One day, while volunteering at preschool I was enlightened. The children would each receive a gold star for things done properly. Keep your cubby neat? Gold star! Put your toys away after play centers? Gold star! This is what I feel like when I work the floor. A job I love for the patient care is insidiously being taken over by boxes to check off.

To me, it is a symptom of a much larger problem set. Few people understand all the things a nurse does in a typical day. Every year, so many new forms are added that soon there will be a form to fill out saying you've completed all your forms. Obviously, documentation is vital, but when is enough too much? Honestly, it saddens me. I thought that I could focus on patient care, not paper care.

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Just to play devil's advocate, because that's normally what I do--when I worked in the hospital, I too had to do hourly rounding, and I HATED it with every bone in my body, so much so that I refused to do it most days, got written up for it, fought with administration, etc. about it. But then it just occurred to me, not too long ago, after reading someone's post on here. This person had a family member in the hospital, and actually had a nurse or some clinical person that completed the hourly rounding, and actually completed the scripting each and every hour, and on top of that, refused to call the patient by their first name, because management wanted "clients" called Mr. or Mrs. (insert name here) because that was supposed to bring up patient satisfaction scores. So, imagine if you irritate your patients so much, by saying to them 24 times in one day with the most ridiculous, nauseating smile "I have the time, Mr. Smith, Do you need to pee" when you know darn well he just walked back and forth to the bathroom himself...well you are only doing what management wanted you to do, aren't you? MAYBE, JUST MAYBE, he will write on his patient satisfaction survey that he was tired of people asking him if he needed to pee!

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