One day I was sitting at a Starbucks near a State run hospital. I saw two healthcare professionals walk in in their scrubs. I don't know what their position was but they had what looked like body cams near the v-cut part of the neck of the top scrub near their badge. Those little Nokia sized devices that police wear. It caught my attention because I know some patients(like meth heads on withdrawal) can't be the nicest people in the world when they don't get what they want when they want it on your shift. I'll admit I was far away but it looked like either a body cam or a walkie talkie but I thought why would they use something that would be loud? A body cam, in this day and age, would sound ingenious. It would be like liability coverage for the professional and the facility.
It was like an eyeopening experience in the field I look forward to growing old with knowing the difficulties I'd experience. Patients would know they're being recorded so they couldn't start with their pathological wants and needs they think they can smuggle by using a stressed out professional in the setting.
Then I thought of the people like security in suits at casinos who watch players. Using those corded walkie talkies to remain discreet and undercover. If hospitals give nurses and doctors including the management ones in charge of the others those kinds of walkie talkies, the nursing field would probably be a lot less stressful.
What do you guy think? With people on tv being shot by police and rants about it on the media and the news, it seems body cams are the perfect insurance when you know your job is always on the line. It would seem to make sense considering police, physicians and nurses all have STRESSFUL jobs. I always had this thought that healthcare professionals had to deal with abuse from combative patients but now I see hope out of that. I don't want to be beaten if there's a way I can get around it.
Also, how do you guys deal with combative patients? How do you deal with the yelling and screaming? and the hitting? I learned in my friends CNA school that stepping away from a patient if they're being abusive is considered neglect. I might not have that right but I know stepping out of the room if their being combative is neglect.
I also learned that straps on the beds used against the patient I believe can only be used by doctor's order and that requires a lot of paperwork because strapping a patient to a bed would be considered abuse and neglect.
I'm starting CNA school soon so I hope I can get some good answers on here that I might not get in CNA school.
I worked on a psych floor for a year and also floated out to medical floors a lot. My psych unit was technically two units, one for geriatrics and one for adults. I've been kicked, hit, scratched, punched many times by the little demented Mawmaws and pawpaws. Like someone said before, they're usually bed bound and not physically able to do much more. So we'd just go in the room with 2 or 3 people incase they got rowdy again. We were also trained to de-escalate combative patients, it's called CPI training. It's basically how to place a patient in a hold. I've only seen that done once on my geriatric floor. Surprising with the adult floor, i personally never saw any issues. on medical floors though, we always called security and supervision and a "Code Gray" which would bring additional security and staff who were trained in CPI. I attended a couple code grays only to find a little Mawmaw on a medical floor who was refusing to have her brief changed. All it took was some kind words to get her to cooperate lol. But if I ever encountered a situation that could get dangerous quickly, I'd probably call the police too.
Nurses do not wear body cameras. This doesn't even need to be a discussion as it does not occur.
So you're saying we shouldn't even have a discussion on the topic? I happen to think this is a very interesting conversation. I would be interested to learn of any studies on this subject. I wonder if body cameras would change the nurse to patient dynamics. Positive or negative...
So you're saying we shouldn't even have a discussion on the topic? I happen to think this is a very interesting conversation. I would be interested to learn of any studies on this subject. I wonder if body cameras would change the nurse to patient dynamics. Positive or negative...
Unlike the police, nurses get fired for using reasonable force to defend themselves against violent patients.
Wearing cameras would be an unbelievable dignity violation, impossible to manage using it in only the right moment (when the theory is to observe patient abuse of the nurse - do you think that only happens when there are no body parts exposed and you're not handling excrement?), and a privacy law NIGHTMARE.
It would turn into a huge huge huge liability issue every time it catches a nurse making even the slightest mistake.
Nurses should use deescalation tactics (e.g. don't argue with a demented pt), safety awareness (stay at arms length, know how to break a grip, stay between pt and door, etc), and calling security/coworkers when it's not safe to handle the patient alone. Restraints are options when other methods have failed.
Can you imagine a LAWYER picking apart a 12 hour shift caught on camera? My aim is to give great care but I am not a robot. Everyone sees dollar signs and lawsuits. No way I would ever wear a camera. I worked at a nursing home that installed cameras a few years back. After reviewing the first week's footage management took them down. Legal told them it was suicide to leave them up. My mom told me that mistakes are like boogers, if you dig hard enough you can always find one.
Specializes in Healthcare risk management and liability.
Personal Activation Device - Guardian Staff Safety Systems In addition to a Vocera, the device could have been a personal staff safety alarm. The Guardian system shown at the link is used commonly in the secure mental health and the correctional settings. I wear one when I am onsite doing risk management consulting at our secure state mental health hospital. I clip mine to my suit jacket lapel, but I see them clipped at scrub necklines, hanging from lanyards and on the waistband of pants.
Ok, so how do you deal with a combative patient. What are the proper steps or procedures?
Combative patients who become a danger to themselves and staff get put in restraints. Harm to self would include: plumbing out of ET Tube, Iv lines, central lines, feeding tubes. Danger to others is physical harm. Restraints do not always work and we can get hurt. I recently was. We when have this type of job, it's bound to happen.
That's a suspicious way of responding to a cause with good intent....
Why, because they don't want to take a chance of the recording just existing out in the world somewhere or it being seen? I feel the same way and my reaction is not a suspicious one, it's a line in the sand of what I will and will not put up with. Someone recording my care for their protection are trying to involve me in an activity that I want no part of.
Specializes in Psych, Addictions, SOL (Student of Life).
As a psych nurse I deal with my share of combative patients and/or family members daily. I always have a witness with me as we are NEVER alone with patients (at least that's policy) still the idea of a body cam is intriguing. Still it's just one more thing for a patient to grab on to when he/she comes after me.
I've seen some of these posts on here where nurses, lpn's and CNA's have been fired for something related to something a non-healthcare professional would do that they don't know is actually abuse(the non-healthcare professional not knowing it's actually abuse). The things I've read in a CNA's handbook of what not to do towards a patient when they're being hostile are baffling. Stepping back or away from a hostile patient in their room is considered neglect? Or if they're being aggressive and you step outside their room until they calm down, that's considered abuse? Or neglect? No, unbelievable. Ok so the second one might sound like a no no. That might not be verbatim from what I've read but I think we all know what I mean. How did you feel when you read some of the things you can't do towards patients in situations you're unsure of how to handle? You probably thought about career change. There's something I'm not being told but I'm sure I"ll learn it in nursing school. Right now, when I go to school to learn the job and start working, I feel like I'll have to hug a angry dementia patient holding a syringe(used or new) as a stabbing weapon who can't remember a few hours ago instead of some way the program or actual employer I'll be working for could tell me. When I graduate, maybe my mind will be fully changed and I'll know but right now I have no idea how to handle them.
I think it's pretty back breaking to breakdown something to someone who forgets. I mean how bad can Alzheimers make someone forget? I've read some posts where nurses, cna's and lpns, or at least one of them, was clawed at and scratched from a woman because the patient thought she was sleeping with her husband when her husband died a decade ago. Make believe post or real things?
I'm a guy and I'm hoping male patients who are elderly won't treat me like that. I'd be the type who would tell him "I don't care about your wife or your family, I'm here to do my job FOR YOU so let me do it." 1. I'd probably get fired 2. He'd probably not get the hint.. what the heck am I supposed to do?
If I was allowed to say that only towards severe dementia patients, it wouldn't be G rated like that. I'd probably come equipped with heavy verbal language.
I really hope guys who are nurses, lpns, or cna's have less issues with patients than women do, no offense ladies.
Beldar_the_Cenobite, CNA
470 Posts
Ok, so how do you deal with a combative patient. What are the proper steps or procedures?