Butt kissing management

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Specializes in Med-Surg.

This makes me so mad! Yesterday I was (yet again) charge nurse. We had a peds patient that was supposed to discharge. The doctor hadn't round, and the LPN providing care asked me if I thought she should hang her AM levaquin. I said "of course"-since the child was still running a temp(doc admits the child should have stayed, but mother insisted he leave-she "had things to do"). Well, doc rounds a few minutes after it was hung. I was at the desk charting, and the mother comes storming up screaming "if ya'll think I am going to stay around for that bag to go in, your crazy. I ain't got all day". I explained to her that the antibiotic, which had started 15 minutes earlier, would be finished in 45 minutes. It would take most of that time for the discharge paperwork to be ready, and for the nurse to be in to do teaching. She again startes screaming about us trying to keep her there to charge he insurnace more. I patiently explain to her that I, nor her nurse, cares how much her insurance is charge, seeing as how our pay doesn't change-and that neither one of us even knows enough about the rules regarding insurance payment to even dream up such a diablic plan. I send her back to her room, mad, but I could care less. Well, my sec that witnessed the whole thing called our DON to tell her about it.

Our butt kissing DON comes up, and goes to the room. When she comes out, I asked her what that was all about. She says, "oh u/s says she was upset about having to wait, so I wanted to smooth things over" She is notorious for giving gift cards to mad family, whether or not we did anything room, so I asked if she did. She said she did. I asked her if she felt my and the LPN did anything wrong, and she said no she didn't, we did what she would have.

So, I voiced to her how upset that mad me. To me, giving the gift card when the staff has done no wrong gives the appearance that we did something we shouldn't have. She replies that the patient's perceptions sometimes are wrong, and we have to be careful of that. So, explain the situation to the patient. Try to change their misconception! Don't kiss their butt so they go to the grocery store and tell others to go to the hospitla and complain "because they give you money if you do" (heard that with my own ear, more than once).

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Specializes in ICU/Critical Care.

wow. Never thought management could stoop so low by bribing families with gift cards.

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Specializes in ER; HBOT- lots others.

i have seen DON's doing that kinda crap all the time. i have seen them do gc's to the hospital places, never off campus stuff. but that is ridicoulous!!

there have been times too that i have seen that someone else will go in and "smoooth" things over. it does tick me off to no end at times, esp when we didnt do anything wrong. but they need to do that, i guess, that is apart of their job. its bs in our eyes, but whatever.

I totally agree that something isnt right w/ the entire town talking about getting free stuff. if you cannot talk to her, or she just wont, you really need to bring this up somehow. the entire rank thing is very impt, but if you cannot talk to her, maybe you need to go and say something to someone above her. that IS NOT right IMHO either.

GL! sorry that you have to deal with stuff like that, i hate that too!

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i have seen DON's doing that kinda crap all the time. i have seen them do gc's to the hospital places, never off campus stuff. but that is ridicoulous!!

there have been times too that i have seen that someone else will go in and "smoooth" things over. it does tick me off to no end at times, esp when we didnt do anything wrong. but they need to do that, i guess, that is apart of their job. its bs in our eyes, but whatever.

I totally agree that something isnt right w/ the entire town talking about getting free stuff. if you cannot talk to her, or she just wont, you really need to bring this up somehow. the entire rank thing is very impt, but if you cannot talk to her, maybe you need to go and say something to someone above her. that IS NOT right IMHO either.

GL! sorry that you have to deal with stuff like that, i hate that too!

since this gives the appearance of wrong doing, i wonder if you shouldnt let risk manegement know of this practice.....i could see someone complaining about whatever and saying "they gave me something to shut me up" so they MUST have been wrong......good luck

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Specializes in Maternal - Child Health.

I'm not condoning the DON's actions. She should have spoken to the mother in your presence (and/or that of the staff nurse) and should not have "bribed" the mother, but on the other hand, she did quiet the mother down long enough for the antibiotic to be given and the paperwork finished. That benefitted both the child and the staff.

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Specializes in Corrections, Cardiac, Hospice.

Did I miss something here? Is sec your secretary? What right does she have interfering with your contact with the patients and their families? Did she actually call to tattle on you like a two year old? I would be fuming about that more than a little gift card. Which, btw, I also think was totally inappropriate.:rolleyes:

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Specializes in ICU,PCU,ER, TELE,SNIFF, STEP DOWN PCT.

First off I have soooooooooo have to laugh at this. Our facility/hosp tried this too. But they were to WALMART! They ranged from $25.00-$50.00 EACH. Well families did JUST what you said they did, since this is a small hosp for 4 counties all these folks realized this is a way to get free stuff. They would complain on every floor and dept( x ray and so on) then when their friends were admitted or patients they did the SAME DAMN thing. Each one bowing down and giving a card to APEASE the upset family/pt so they would come back to our hosp for yet another procedure( I mean WTH else would they go? The bigger hosp were "too far away" many said.:uhoh3:

This was REALLY bad around Christmas too. Management smiled and handed out more cards. The employees got zip for a bonus but some of these folks walked out with a couple hundred in gift cards and it made us sick and ****** when we realized that is all they had to do was whine.:flmngmd:

Entire families and friends and pt who were frequent fliers got real good at this too. Finally after a while the hosp wised up, and handed out $5.00 cards to be used in house only.:banghead:

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Specializes in Tele, ED/Pediatrics, CCU/MICU.

Our department's Director handed out goody bags to patients one day, when we were holding admissions for up to 24 hours....

Perhaps we could instead use money to acquire more nursing staff.

It appears that condoning and encouraging bad behavior is the new norm.....

When someone acts out in triage and let's their emotions escalate, they are generally rewarded with special treatment.

And thus, the cycle goes on..... show some bad behavior, attract the attention of management, and have your behavior reinforced by getting what you want, getting a gift, or getting your proverbial bum kissed by the director.

And this is all so we can have good survey scores??

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Specializes in neuro, ICU/CCU, tropical medicine.

Don't take it personally. It happens, it's really not a reflection on you, but health care is a service industry, and... draw you own conclusions.

A couple of years ago I had a patient transferred to the unit who had had a witnessed 'seizure' on the floor. They had given her a benzo to stop the seizure, and now she was, apparently, unresponsive.

The nursing supervisor came to the unit with her insisting that I give her flumazenil to reverse the benzo she had gotten. I refused and informed the supervisor that if she had indeed had a seizure and I gave her flumazenil she could very likely have another seizure.

So, I did my neuro assessment. I have to hand it to this girl, I when I did nailbed pressure she didn't flinch or withdraw at all, but as I was moving her arms I noticed just a hint of muscle tone that I would not have if the was truly a GCS 3. "Hey, wait a minute!"

I held her hand above her face and dropped it. It 'fell' on the pillow above her head. "You're faking it." Miraculously, a minute later she 'woke up.'

Neither the patient nor her boyfriend were pleased that I had discovered her malingering, so the supervisor gave them a couple of 'service recovery boxes.' I don't know what was in them.

Interestingly enough, that nursing supervisor seemed to have a lot more respect for me after that event.

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Specializes in Neuro, Cardiology, ICU, Med/Surg.

This seems like a byproduct of the culture of "customer service" that's permeated the hospital world of late. It sounds like your DON had no problem with your work, but wanted to smooth things over for the difficult patient (or family, in this case) so that the customer satisfaction scores improve. :uhoh21:

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Specializes in ICU/Critical Care.
Don't take it personally. It happens, it's really not a reflection on you, but health care is a service industry, and... draw you own conclusions.

A couple of years ago I had a patient transferred to the unit who had had a witnessed 'seizure' on the floor. They had given her a benzo to stop the seizure, and now she was, apparently, unresponsive.

The nursing supervisor came to the unit with her insisting that I give her flumazenil to reverse the benzo she had gotten. I refused and informed the supervisor that if she had indeed had a seizure and I gave her flumazenil she could very likely have another seizure.

So, I did my neuro assessment. I have to hand it to this girl, I when I did nailbed pressure she didn't flinch or withdraw at all, but as I was moving her arms I noticed just a hint of muscle tone that I would not have if the was truly a GCS 3. "Hey, wait a minute!"

I held her hand above her face and dropped it. It 'fell' on the pillow above her head. "You're faking it." Miraculously, a minute later she 'woke up.'

Neither the patient nor her boyfriend were pleased that I had discovered her malingering, so the supervisor gave them a couple of 'service recovery boxes.' I don't know what was in them.

Interestingly enough, that nursing supervisor seemed to have a lot more respect for me after that event.

Had a wonderful female patient that faked seizures. Of course it happened with everyone in the room. So I leave to call the doc who says that he knows she fakes seizures and he's not ordering any benzos. So when I get back to the room, the first thing the girl asks me is "can i get some ativan"..I said "no and the doctor said your seizures aren't real". She didn't mess with me the rest of the night although later in the morning she put on a wonderful performance by pretending she had stridor. I told her to knock it off, stridor cleared right up.

Some of the other nurses didn't agree with my methods or me telling her that she was faking it but I had other patients to care for and I certainly wasn't going to cater to her antics.

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I am not an rn yet but when I worked in customer service 20 years ago, the motto was "the customer is always right" (no matter what). It is a shame that a hospital responds this way too.

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