what is your hospital or facilities policy on a doc giving orders to you at a pt's bedside? we had a nurse go with a doc to the bedside .. the doc talked to the pt's said some things he wanted to do to the nurse ,, sounded like orders to her .. she wrote them as orders ........... .. and it turns out the Doc was just thinking out loud and did not want those orders written Doc said he was "thinking out loud"...................... nurse got written up....... here's my take on orders by the bedside.... i don't do it............... if a doc wants to give a bedside order.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,. he is there he can write it himself.. also you cannot repeat back orders when given by the bedside... i repeat back orders on the phone and when a doc talks to me at the nurses station.... i have had dr's tell me things by the bedside and have not written them as orders ( many times ..)... if he wants them written he is there he can write the orders himself... what do you think? i just don't take bedside orders....
thank you all in advance.. sorry if this is poorly written just got off a 15 hour shift.... exhausted...
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
"is that a verbal order, doctor?" that little phrase takes the ambiguity out of most bedside ramblings.
we take a fair amount of verbal orders -- our providers are often in the midst of a sterile procedure on the patient in 1a when i need an order for a patient in 4b. i could wait until they're finished and then ask them to write the order, but usually when they're finished with one procedure they have to run off and put a line in another patient, or accompany a transport to the cath lab or something. so we do take verbal orders. any time i call them "doctor", though, they know it's formal. so if they don't want me to write it as an order, they'll tell me.
and then there are the orders that are so stupid no one would willingly sign their name to them. asking "is that a verbal order, doctor?" often makes them rethink the order and if not, asking them to write it themselves sure does!
LouisVRN, RN
672 Posts
I will only do it in the case of an emergency and then I tell will usually tell him, here sign this while I go get X, Y, Z please.