Title says it all . Second semester baby nurse in clinicals at a major hospital.
Patients = Awesome
Most Nurses = Very sweet and helpful
Some nurses are rude, terse, horrible with patients, horrible with students and horrible with each other.
To those nurses I say this, please retire.
Its only a matter of time before management figures out they can live without you and hire some very hungry and very competent new grads that want to be there to fill your dusty shoes....
word...
sadly the vast majority of the time these happen to also be charge nurses....in charge of what? Misery?
Patientes have choices in most cities and do not have to go to your hospital.....
I promise you the customer focused model is going to return....
Be advised
Customer service is killing nursing.
People will always get sick, need surgery, etc. The job will always be there.
For every patient who chooses hospital A another will choose hospital B. Doctor's (by way of admission privileges) and insurance companies choose the hospital a patient uses and neither of those entities really care about "customer service" they care about the almighty dollar.
The customer focused model has never left.
With your attitude you'll be perfect for management. Unfortunately good managers are far too often bad for actual patient care.
Nursing is hard and work can get frustrating, but honestly nurses need to be nicer to nursing students and CNA students. We've all been there, so stop being mean to people. It annoys me to see nurses and CNAs leave students behind at a computer or a desk and just flat out ignore them. I've grabbed students and asked them to come and observe or help me with stuff. No one is better than anyone, suck it up and be nice.
All i got to say is I finished nursing school a year ago but learned so much more in the past year working with the "seasoned" nurses than nursing school barely skimmed on.
And....when the chocolate pudding hits the fan and that little blue switch on wall is pulled, take a second to look at who is next to you at that faithful hour. I can tell you it ain't going to be "Polly Anna", she is at the door not knowing what to do and will confuse a vial of mucomyst for succinylcholine. Laugh now, but that scenario happened actually happened to me and "Polly Anna" was the charge nurse for the day.
I am a very pleasant person. I am respectful, I work hard, and I do anything that i am told to do with out question as long as it is legal and in the patients best interest.
You want me to clean up a cdiff eexplosion. No worries, it matters not.
I smile, I am kind and I treat everyone who crosses my path like solid gold.
I do not care how I am treated...but when I see these creatures treating the patients badly, thats where I draw the line.....most of the patients in this hospital are indigent and are too scared to report their poor treatment......
I have found some of the indigent have an attitude of entitlement that is similar to the very rich...they could give Paris Hilton a run for her money. Most of them know very well how to complain and I have heard one say "I'm going to get that one fired." (and they almost did) I called the MD and Supervisor and told them what I heard them say or it might have happened. (and the nurse wasn't doing anything wrong or mean, just setting a reasonable limit politely)
Obviously you had some nice patient's who aren't like this but it was the generalization of the poor are weak and afraid to complain for fear of retaliation that sort of made me go "what???"
As for the OOOOOOLLLLLLLLLD! (hey I'm 50, that's old to you, not to me.)
ageism is like racism and can be contagious. Just so long as you judge me as a person, there are plenty of young nasty mean dried up nurses that should retire to a new career as well, before it's too late and they get replaced by a new grad too!
I have a degree in management and tons of management experience, as soon as possible it is my goal to become a nurse manager and guess what, It is going to my mission in life to bring customer service back to nursing care. Remember the customer? Yes, the one in the bed, yes, thats right, the patient.
Great.... you are the lead character in my nursing nightmare. Nightmare is: new nurses who don't want to actually take care of patients... don't earn any street cred as a bedside nurse... but think they are ingenious enough to direct how others care for patients.... new nurses who want to fast track it into management so they can keep their hands clean and take every patient's side against any nurse they want to complain about... all the while regurgitating new policies based on evidenced based practice... which sound great but the bedside nurses can't fully act on them because management is unable to give the bedside nurses the resources necessary to actually make the patient safe, happy and comfortable.... quick wake me up!
Eh. I have been a nurse for three years and I can get very bitter, dried up, and feel like I need to retire. The demands on nurses are ridiculous and keeping a positive attitude and plastering on a smile does not always happen. It's very difficult to keep customer service on the positive spectrum when you have 10 family members in a room asking you question after question after question about why you're doing this, that, what med is that, this, how come you're not doing the same thing the other nurse did, how come you don't ask the same questions he/she did yesterday, last week. I recently took care of a patient whose family kept a huge notebook with notes on how long the nurses took to give am meds, how long the PCTs took to change the pt's diaper, and what each medicine was that the pt was taking, even though that pt has been taking the exact same meds for years. All of this was done while recording each person's name and title. Obviously, they were not happy with the care they received because we just did not live up to their standards. I worked retail for 10 years before I became a nurse and the "customers" in nursing and retail are extremely different. It's hard being a nurse and keeping people happy all the time. To say that customer satisfaction is not important is inaccurate. But, is it the whole of what nursing is about? No. Being a nurse goes beyond what anyone else sees. The behind-the-scenes action (i.e. making sure med errors don't happen, finding resources for support for that raped pt, finding resources for that pt who really does not have any financial means to continue with his care, etc.) is mind-blowing and exhausting.
My point? Learn the important things needed from those nurses that can help you be a good nurse, listen to their advice, let it go when they are mean to you, report it when they are mean to pts/family, and be the best nurse you can be. In the long run, what really matters is that vulnerable pt's life you are taking care of.
Customer service: I can't always give you what you want, when you want it...but I'll do my darndest, with a smile on my face, and when we part I know I will have done my best to help you understand that.
Op...I hear ya! Maybe your initial choice of words was not supreme, but I forgive you.
It breaks my heart to see people crushing others, it would be an ideal world where the tired, the angry, the meanies could move on. Until then,I keep my philosophy: do unto the others, as you would have unto your mothers (even if your mother was a royall nutter). Hard work for sure!!!!!!
I'm not sure if you all are in denial or just have never come across the type of ppl the OP is talking about... however there are bitter nurses who HATE students and refuse to teach them anything, complain when they have students on the floor... and use orientees as their slaves, not helping them, just delegating tasks.
I have seen this type and suggestions of "learning from" this nurse is impossible when they don't share their knowledge bc they are "better" than everyone else. luckily my manager didnt agree with this mindset
Although they may look similar on the surface, there is a huge difference between "dried up" and "used up" nurses.
Dried up = nurses who have died on the vine, so to speak. Whatever their chronological or career age, they don't receive sustenance and stay vital because they don't see themselves as needing to keep an eye on EBP or acquire new skills. Their essence has evaporated and their passion has shriveled.
Used up = nurses who work with insufficient support from management, whose facilities try to squeeze every last drop of enthusiasm and effort out of them by mandating overtime and not replacing necessary staff or equipment when they disappear. These are the folks in the the trenches who are barely allowed to show up on their own radar and who are encouraged--no, heavily pressured--to skip breaks, steal supplies from other floors, indulge in lateral violence, give up their days off to facilitate inadequate hiring/staffing and generally take it on the chin when "customers" come up with bizarro expectations that violate the hospital's OWN P&P.
Thank the lord, I had only one brief exposure to the second kind of situation when I was straight out of nursing school and didn't realize how badly I was being treated. And I hope never to be a part of that first group who are greatly responsible for their own misery.
Wouldn't it be nice (for everyone except the patients, of course) if the nurses who just want to "phone it in" worked for the folks who see staff as a bunch of petulant appliances to be plugged in and kicked at will?
:redpinkhe:yeah:
kids
1 Article; 2,334 Posts
Customer service is killing nursing.
People will always get sick, need surgery, etc. The job will always be there.
For every patient who chooses hospital A another will choose hospital B. Doctor's (by way of admission privileges) and insurance companies choose the hospital a patient uses and neither of those entities really care about "customer service" they care about the almighty dollar.
The customer focused model has never left.
With your attitude you'll be perfect for management. Unfortunately good managers are far too often bad for actual patient care.