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Discussion

Being interrupted during report.

I'm a new nurse working overnights. As such I give report to the 8 am nurse. Working 12-8, I'm exhausted by 8 am. I'm ready to go home. Does it drive anyone else crazy when people insist on interrupting report? Yesterday it was about 8 and a nurse who has been out on maternity leave had returned. I hadn't met her as she had been out when I started. She works in a different area so I wasnt giving report to her, but to her friend. She must have interrupted report 5 or 6 times with nonsense. Running in to hug her friend, coming back in to show baby pictures, coming in again to yell at her friend for something she had said on Facebook. Really???? I just sat there for five minutes each time waiting until she finally went away only to be interrupted again two seconds later. It was 8:40 by the time I finally got out of there.

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    I am not a nurse yet, but I do have to relay info to my supervisors in a prompt manner, everyday. So I think it is very rude to interrupt report, or when someone is trying to give you valuable information. I have listened to nurses give report and then go on about some personal issue. Maybe you can redirect the nurse kindly back to your report so you can get out on time. Best of luck.

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    I take a very dim view of interrupting report for stupid things. Just how seriously does that nurse take the rest of her job? If I was stuck till 0840 I would bill the facility for my overtime. If they balk at paying, I would tell them exactly what happened and ask if maybe at the next staff meeting there could be a policy review about report interruptions.

    This probably sounds curmudgeonly but after putting up with similar nonsense over the years I've become quite hard-a$$ed about certain issues.

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    I do not like being interrupted during report-HUGE pet peeve. That nurse was being rude IMO. That is great she had a baby and such, but I would have politely spoken up to keep things moving along.

    You are abseolutely right in the fact that it is at the end of the shift, you are tired, and if you had to work the following night then it was cutting into your sleep time too. Next time speak up. I was say something along the lines of "I'm sorry, but I need to finish giving you report because I am tired and I need to go home."

    They should understand-I'd bet a million dollars they are the same way at the end of their shift. There is just no need for all that. I could go on and on about my report pet peeves. Report should be direct and the person on the receiving end should be giving you 100% of their time. I wonder how much vital information she missed by barely paying attention. That isn't fair to the patients.

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    I agree with the above post. If you are too nice, they will walk ALL OVER you. Sometimes, you have to just put your foot down. Be direct and tell the nurse something like, "Can I finish giving you report? I'm really exhausted" etc.

    I'm a night shifter as well, and we are extra tired compared to day shift when they get off. More often then not, they don't even consider that when we are giving them report in the morning.

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    • Expert

    Oh thank you so very much for starting this thread, chiclet74! This is an area of great contention for me. I have some tride and true methods on how to deal with it.

    First, know yourself. Give yourself credit for being a Professional Person of Integrity. Know that you know your job responsibilities and that you have your priorities in order. We are Nurses- First and Foremost. Work always comes before pleasure. We don't get paid for bringing our homelife to work.

    One of your responsibilities may be informing a Peer or Co-Worker of their responsibilities. It's not always pleasant, but somebody has to do it. For example, I've said, "I need to give you report. You need to listen'". (I have found that the word "should" has a tendency to push People's buttons. So I avoid the word should for the word "need".)

    Be direct and factually objective. Look the Other Person in the eye. If the Other person does not make eye contact, you may say, "May I have your attention, please? Please look at me while I'm speaking to you".

    Choose your words carefully and say them slowly and clearly with well-paced cadence. You will not have to raise your voice. Your voice will convey determination. (I like to think of Clint Eastwood's whisper. The Bad Guys always give him attention.)

    There are a lot of other nuances that goes along with the subtle art of intimidation, such as body language. For example, to avoid conflict or the essence of confrontation, when you look the Other Person in the eye, do it with your head slighty turned away from them- not "face to face", so to speak. Keep your eyelids relaxed- no wide eye looks. Heavy lids convey self-assurence, whereas wide eyes convey excitement.

    If you want the Other Person to cease something, hold your dominant hand, palm facing the Other Person, next to your shoulder. This conveys "stop" without being "in their face".

    These techniques will give you something to go on, chicklet74. Good luck to you.

    Dave

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    :nurse:"i'm giving report and i'd like to finish without interruptions. thank you."

    "i see you don't want report." (exit and report incident to nursing administration)

    "excuse me. i plan to give and finish report."(keep talking non-stop until you finish verbalizing the information---talk through the interruptions)

    ;););)

    notice i did not ask permission to give report because your colleagues could care less.

    lesson: don't play the "victim" role to colleagues, patients or otherwise.

    no way!

    :twocents:

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    I had a bit of a similar situation that I'm going to share. The moral of the story? Be assertive.

    I make it a point to try clock out as soon as I'm able to so that I can go home, especially when I'm on night shift. One of the issues that I was having was that some of our weekend nurses would spend so much time chit-chatting off the unit (albeit, on the same floor) that even five minutes before I could technically leave, I had not given report yet on any of my patients even though I had finished all of my charting and tasks. And this would happen every weekend shift that I worked.

    So, some of the new nurses and I decided that we needed to be more assertive. We started walking out to drag them to the unit to give them report. If they weren't in a hallway (in a private locker room, for example) we'd walk into there, interrupt, and give them report on the spot (along with a printout of the patient's orders). If we knew they were on another unit, we'd call over there and ask them to come over, otherwise they'd get a telephone report (and they would come over). We also told our manager at our next meeting... she sent out an announcement via e-mail to all staff to be ready for report and that she would address any issues with people personally if she received names of individuals who were giving her problems.

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    • Expert
    :nurse:

    "i see you don't want report." (exit and report incident to nursing administration)

    let's say you choose this option and the patient experiences a preventable event. who do you think will end up wearing that?

    hand-offs have been identified as a crucial factor in patient safety. ( http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/nbk2649/ ) as well, failure to provide the nurse taking responsibility for the patient with a comprehensive report prior to leaving the unit may be considered patient abandonment. from the california board of registered nurses:

    " generally for patient abandonment to occur, the nurse must:

    a) have first accepted the patient assignment, thus establishing a nurse-patient relationship, and then

    b) severed that nurse-patient relationship without giving reasonable notice to the appropriate person

    (e.g., supervisor, patient) so that arrangements can be made for continuation of nursing care by others. "

    if something subsequently happened to one of the patients you were responsible for reporting off about, it would be your word against the nurse who should have been listening. the bon will believe her/him. it will be your license that is revoked.

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    • Expert

    If I'm needlessly interrupted during report, I just stop giving report and go silent. After a minute or so someone will ask what I stopped and I'll politely reply, "I was waiting for X to finish talking so everyone could hear me." I also don't leave until I finish giving report, so if being gently called out on it doesn't help them get the hint, being late getting out to the floor will...especially since it's a group report, and often the others are peeved at being held up because of the interruptions.

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    :nurse:"i'm giving report and i'd like to finish without interruptions. thank you."

    "i see you don't want report." (exit and report incident to nursing administration)

    "excuse me. i plan to give and finish report."(keep talking non-stop until you finish verbalizing the information---talk through the interruptions)

    ;););)

    notice i did not ask permission to give report because your colleagues could care less.

    lesson: don't play the "victim" role to colleagues, patients or otherwise.

    no way!

    :twocents:

    i had a coworker who constantly interrupted while i was giving her report. one time she breezed in at the last minute, plopped down, and i swear the words out of her mouth were "you don't have to give report i already know everything." so i said (to the back of her head) "okay, have a good night. the one in 3 should be back from the er within the hour and 6's picc line flushes beautifully, vanco's in the med cart. see you tomorrow." she turned back around and quit talking right away! other times i just talked over her when she tried to talk about her dog, kids (sorry, it's not that your kids aren't awesome but i get written up for unauthorized overtime), boat, fishing, some random thing she saw on tv. usually she'd get the hint pretty quickly, other times i'd just keep talking over her. going silent just encouraged her to keep talking. i never asked permission to give report, never asked if she wanted it. you're here, clocked in, getting paid, you're taking report now and can socialize during your break.

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    Now that is frustrating and inappropriate. I can understand a patient desatting next door to say the low 80's or something (or something else related to patient care/safety) that can "interrupt report" because that happens...but that nonsense that you mentioned, OP? Ridiculous.

    And I agree with the other comments...if you are too nice they will walk all over you. Unfortunately I have that problem.

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    • Expert

    Next time don't be so accommodating. Speak up for yourself.

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