Do Nurses have to do the following??

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Do Nurses have to clean up after patients'?

For instance, if a patient throws up all over themselves or poops on themselves, do Nurses have to clean them up?

What is the most disgusting thing that you have done for a patient?

Give me the dirty 'lowdown' on the gritty work that some Nurses are forced to endure.

They are Supposed to,but in my experiences most of them don't.I am currently a CNA and I can't count how many times Nurses have told me "so and so is dirty,threw up,or whatever."....This usually happens while I am bathing a patient or giving some sort of care and a nurse will walk pass the call light to find me,remind me,and go and sit at the desk,while the patient has to sit in mess till I'm done :banghead:......I wish that I worked with some of the nurses on this board who actually care.

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Specializes in Family Practice, Mental Health.
Honestly, I would rather be in the position of being the one to help the patient stay clean and comfortable than to be in the patient's shoes.

Imagine as a patient if you were incontinent of feces/urine or had vomited all over yourself and the nurse looked at you, wrinkled her nose and said "I don't clean patients- I have a BSN. You'll have to wait for the CNA/poop fairy/family members/whoever to come help you get cleaned up."

Treat others how you would want to be treated :nurse:

SIgh...... If only it were that easy - to "Treat others how you would want to be treated" and have it all turn out well.

I think that those who are the most jaded in nursing, are the ones who started out thinking most similarly to the Golden Rule. And perhaps still do, underneath it all - covered up by all that jade, however.........

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Specializes in LTC/hospital, home health (VNA).

A good nurse will not only clean up "poo" but use that time to check out the condition of the patient's skin and how much ability they have to care for themselves.

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Specializes in Telemetry.
How sad..

I just really want to know what kinds of duties that a Nursing job entails.

The good, the bad, and the ugly.

Why do you find that sad? Taking care of people is a wonderful experience.

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Specializes in Family Practice, Mental Health.
They are Supposed to,but in my experiences most of them don't.I am currently a CNA and I can't count how many times Nurses have told me "so and so is dirty,threw up,or whatever."....This usually happens while I am bathing a patient or giving some sort of care and a nurse will walk pass the call light to find me,remind me,and go and sit at the desk,while the patient has to sit in mess till I'm done :banghead:......I wish that I worked with some of the nurses on this board who actually care.

Mr. So and So rings the light. He's lying in about 15 minutes worth of poop-detail cleanup, but he's physiologically stable.

Meanwhile.........

I've got a patient in the other room with a b/p of 78/42. I've paged the doc, and I am busy trying to get an IV in this same patient so that I can give fluids. Meanwhile, I have someone else who is working with me who can't start the IV, and can't take orders from the doc, but CAN help by doing peri-care on my other patient in the other room.

Meanwhile...........

I've got a patient whose abdominal wound is seeping bloody drainage around the dressing. The patient's lying in a big pile of ooze. Gosh, I sure hope the wound hasn't dehissed. I need to change the dressing and see what's going on underneath all of that gauze, but I'm still waiting for that call back from the doc for my patient with the low blood pressure. I should probably take another blood pressure, go ahead and start IV fluids without a dr's order, and.......

Darn....My patient whose got the poopy but is on the light again. "I need some help!"

I poke my head in the door. "Sorry Mr. So and So, I'll be back in to take care of you in just a moment."

In the distance, I hear an IV pump start alarming. "Shoot - my blood infusion is already finished in room 424........I need some help."

I'm on my way to the IV alarm and the doc calls back. I'm sitting at the desk talking on the phone with the doc when my coworker/CNA comes to me to see what I needed. I'm writing down a lengthy order that needs to be faxed to the pharmacy, then I have to get the med, give the med............

"Can you please go help Mr. So and So - he's all dirty". (I get a dirty look from the CNA as she walks away.)

By the way.......I do care. I care about the kidneys that are about to go south on the patient with the low blood pressure if I can't get the blood pressure back up. Meanwhile, I'm taking matters into my own hands in order to address that issue - I finally get an order from the doc to cover me for what I just did.

I also care about the patient whose leaking out about two cups worth of serous/sanguinous fluid from their abdominal wound that I need to assess.

I also care about what the CNA thinks of me, but I can't even begin to explain all the reasons why I need the peri care done by the CNA instead of doing it myself.

As I get off the phone, I hear a loud crash from down the hallway. A patient tried to get up by themselves and has just fell on the way to the BR.

So much for waltzing out the door on time tonight.

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Specializes in ICU/Critical Care.

Did you honestly think that because we have the big RN or LPN behind our name that we are exempt from providing basic patient care? If you have a problem with wiping behinds and getting down to the nitty-gritty of nursing, perhaps this is not the field for you.

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Specializes in ER; HBOT- lots others.

the na's have tons more pt's than i do. you MAKE time for your pt's. i sure hope that you are not thinking you are above doing total pt care. because sometimes, it happens. or sometimes you have no choice because of your aid.

i am still just a little lost on why you asked this kind of question i guess.

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How sad..

I just really want to know what kinds of duties that a Nursing job entails.

The good, the bad, and the ugly.

I am a charge nurse and I regularly deal with vomit, sputum, feces and urine, blood, puss, and so on. It doesn't matter what your degree is- if you work in pt care you will deal with these things. And any nurse who takes a non-clinical job without a solid clinical background is clueless, ineffective, and not a real nurse, imo (flame away).

As another poster said- and only experienced nurses would understand- cleaning feces and urine are the fun parts of nursing.

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Mr. So and So rings the light. He's lying in about 15 minutes worth of poop-detail cleanup, but he's physiologically stable.

Meanwhile.........

I've got a patient in the other room with a b/p of 78/42. I've paged the doc, and I am busy trying to get an IV in this same patient so that I can give fluids. Meanwhile, I have someone else who is working with me who can't start the IV, and can't take orders from the doc, but CAN help by doing peri-care on my other patient in the other room.

Meanwhile...........

I've got a patient whose abdominal wound is seeping bloody drainage around the dressing. The patient's lying in a big pile of ooze. Gosh, I sure hope the wound hasn't dehissed. I need to change the dressing and see what's going on underneath all of that gauze, but I'm still waiting for that call back from the doc for my patient with the low blood pressure. I should probably take another blood pressure, go ahead and start IV fluids without a dr's order, and.......

Darn....My patient whose got the poopy but is on the light again. "I need some help!"

I poke my head in the door. "Sorry Mr. So and So, I'll be back in to take care of you in just a moment."

In the distance, I hear an IV pump start alarming. "Shoot - my blood infusion is already finished in room 424........I need some help."

I'm on my way to the IV alarm and the doc calls back. I'm sitting at the desk talking on the phone with the doc when my coworker/CNA comes to me to see what I needed. I'm writing down a lengthy order that needs to be faxed to the pharmacy, then I have to get the med, give the med............

"Can you please go help Mr. So and So - he's all dirty". (I get a dirty look from the CNA as she walks away.)

By the way.......I do care. I care about the kidneys that are about to go south on the patient with the low blood pressure if I can't get the blood pressure back up. Meanwhile, I'm taking matters into my own hands in order to address that issue - I finally get an order from the doc to cover me for what I just did.

I also care about the patient whose leaking out about two cups worth of serous/sanguinous fluid from their abdominal wound that I need to assess.

I also care about what the CNA thinks of me, but I can't even begin to explain all the reasons why I need the peri care done by the CNA instead of doing it myself.

As I get off the phone, I hear a loud crash from down the hallway. A patient tried to get up by themselves and has just fell on the way to the BR.

So much for waltzing out the door on time tonight.

I appreciate your post.I understand that sometimes CNA"s are not aware of how much work the nurses have to

do.I know there may be times when it appears that the nurses are "sitting at the desk."but all the while they are charting,waiting on a call,or various other things.In my experiences,and in MY post I was not referring to those situations or those nurses.Sorry,but in my world,In Chicago,In the many nursing homes and hospitals that I have worked in my first scenario is the norm.The nurses Will find me,tell Me,and sit down to do NOTHING.I wish that this were not the case but it is.

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Specializes in neonatal intensive care.

"Mr. So and So rings the light. He's lying in about 15 minutes worth of poop-detail cleanup, but he's physiologically stable.

Meanwhile.........

I've got a patient in the other room with a b/p of 78/42. I've paged the doc, and I am busy trying to get an IV in this same patient so that I can give fluids. Meanwhile, I have someone else who is working with me who can't start the IV, and can't take orders from the doc, but CAN help by doing peri-care on my other patient in the other room.

Meanwhile...........

I've got a patient whose abdominal wound is seeping bloody drainage around the dressing. The patient's lying in a big pile of ooze. Gosh, I sure hope the wound hasn't dehissed. I need to change the dressing and see what's going on underneath all of that gauze, but I'm still waiting for that call back from the doc for my patient with the low blood pressure. I should probably take another blood pressure, go ahead and start IV fluids without a dr's order, and.......

Darn....My patient whose got the poopy but is on the light again. "I need some help!"

I poke my head in the door. "Sorry Mr. So and So, I'll be back in to take care of you in just a moment."

In the distance, I hear an IV pump start alarming. "Shoot - my blood infusion is already finished in room 424........I need some help."

I'm on my way to the IV alarm and the doc calls back. I'm sitting at the desk talking on the phone with the doc when my coworker/CNA comes to me to see what I needed. I'm writing down a lengthy order that needs to be faxed to the pharmacy, then I have to get the med, give the med............

"Can you please go help Mr. So and So - he's all dirty". (I get a dirty look from the CNA as she walks away.)

By the way.......I do care. I care about the kidneys that are about to go south on the patient with the low blood pressure if I can't get the blood pressure back up. Meanwhile, I'm taking matters into my own hands in order to address that issue - I finally get an order from the doc to cover me for what I just did.

I also care about the patient whose leaking out about two cups worth of serous/sanguinous fluid from their abdominal wound that I need to assess.

I also care about what the CNA thinks of me, but I can't even begin to explain all the reasons why I need the peri care done by the CNA instead of doing it myself.

As I get off the phone, I hear a loud crash from down the hallway. A patient tried to get up by themselves and has just falled on the way to the BR.

So much for waltzing out the door on time tonight."

And the CNA sees you sitting down, talking on the phone and asking her to do the dirty work. Sometimes they just don't realize you are doing what only the RN can do. Yes, the RN CAN clean the dirty patient, but the CNA cannot take the dr's orders, hang the blood and start the IV.

And the CNA thinks the RN has "nursitis."

You gotta do what you gotta do.

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Specializes in ED, Flight.

Seriously and simply: nurses do EVERYTHING.

Anything that is in the realm of patient care, nurses may have to do; and probably will on some occasion. It just depends on the circumstances and location.

Nursing is a 'no holds barred' profession. And we're proud of it!:smokin:

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Specializes in Psych, Med/Surg, Home Health, Oncology.
I appreciate your post.I understand that sometimes CNA"s are not aware of how much work the nurses have to

do.I know there may be times when it appears that the nurses are "sitting at the desk."but all the while they are charting,waiting on a call,or various other things.In my experiences,and in MY post I was not referring to those situations or those nurses.Sorry,but in my world,In Chicago,In the many nursing homes and hospitals that I have worked in my first scenario is the norm.The nurses Will find me,tell Me,and sit down to do NOTHING.I wish that this were not the case but it is.

I hate to admit it, but, yes, I've seen those types of nurses, too. In fact when I had my hip replacements, I had a few of them!!

In all my 43 years at the bedside, I've always tried to do my best for patients!!

Please remember, as someone else said, you can get LOTS of information about a pt. while doing clean-up duty--skin codition, how they move, how appropriate they are, etc. At the same time, you can also do pt. teaching and also be giving them the emotional support they often need.

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