I can't help but get frustrated at the disrespect I get by pts who come in and don't get the dilaudid or the (30) 10mg norco script they demand...
Ive only been a RN for a year and this is out of control. Yesterday I got yelled at by a pt because she has chronic back pain, frequent flyer and was ****** she got 5mg norco this week instead of her usual 10mg, another one refused all meds but dilaudid and we had to call security because she became irate..
The last hospital I worked at, they stopped giving dilaudid and had signs posted up around the ER stating "we no longer administer dilaudid IV" Some dr's give in and some don't...but most do and that just makes the problem worse!
Just venting because I feel like they come in and walk all over us. We are just waitresses to them and all the hospital cares about is pt satisfaction. I dont care if drug addicts are satisfied or not...
i know what you mean....and sometimes i just want to call them out on it and tell them i know they are really just druggies. i got a patient from the ER a few weeks ago who came in with abd pain and rectal bleeding. or so she says. this lady is such a frequent flyer/med seeker that she has a special care plan in the ER. as soon as she got to the floor i went in to do vitals and admit her. she was on the phone speaking in some kind of code language and when she saw me come in the room she said to whoever she was talking to "i cant talk right now, the nurse is here." so kind of gave me the hint she was doing a drug deal or was up to no good. i couldnt even introduce myself before she asked for her 2mg of dilaudid. i told her i had to get her admitted first and i had no orders from the doctor yet. she immediately broke into sobs and said she was promised 2mg of dilaudid when she got up here. i ignored her and did her admission, paged the doctor for orders. while im waiting for the doc to call back shes pressing the call light asking again for dilaudid. told her i was waiting to hear from the doc and she starts freaking out about how its not fair to keep people waiting who are in pain, blah blah blah. the doctor calls me back and guess what...orders 0.5mg dilaudid. so i go in to give it to her, start pushing it and she asks me how much it is. I say 0.5mg. she says POINT FIVE??? POINT FIVE?!?!? starts yelling at me. I said "thats what the doctor ordered so thats what you get, im sorry." well shes sobbing and talking on and on about how shes getting treated and demanding to see the doctor RIGHT NOW. thankfully that was the end of my shift and i got to pass her on to the night shift nurse. later that night though the doctor did end up changing her medicine to 2mg and gave her a fentanyl patch after she said the 2mg still wasnt enough. Well they had to rapid response her in the middle of the night because she ATE the fentanyl patch and was nonresponsive, pupils fixed, and respirations were 6 per minute. Some Narcan woke her right up but just goes to show you cant give in to these people because once they get their way they wont stop.
The thing i hate about these types of patients is the time they suck from you. They take away from 90 year old ladies and gents who are truly sick. They are constantly calling for meds and want you to call the Doc for more. They are also constantly looking for excuses to stay in the hospital. I cannot stand the behavior.
Drug seekers have diminished my capacity for empathy. I regret that loss for my other pts and for myself. It has made me a less effective nurse when dealing with complaints of pain.
What gets to me is often it is us hard working, honest, taxpaying citizens that are paying for their drug habit. How many of them are hard working & honest vs. the ones spending tax dollars (Medicare, welfare, ect) to pay for their habit? Meanwhile we must mollycoddle them for the sake of "customer service" and "patient rights". Grrrrr...
Wow. Drug seekers vs. truly sick. Aren't the drug seekers just as 'sick' as the lol with a hip fx? What a way to spend your life - what to get, where to get it, how much you're going to get. Lose your job, your home, your car, your child, your freedom and possibly your life. Sign me up. And just to add insult to injury, the nurses hate you, too. Or at the very least resent you.
Wow. Drug seekers vs. truly sick. Aren't the drug seekers just as 'sick' as the lol with a hip fx? What a way to spend your life - what to get, where to get it, how much you're going to get. Lose your job, your home, your car, your child, your freedom and possibly your life. Sign me up. And just to add insult to injury, the nurses hate you, too. Or at the very least resent you.
Sad but true, some people are incapable of making "choices". Its not like they chose to be drug addicts. They didn't wake up one day and decide that they were going to get themselves hooked on their drug of choice, whether it be pain pills, crack, alcohol, nicotine or caffeine.
Some receptor in their brain decided for them, and that receptor screams for more and more of that lovely drug.
Do I have empathy for them? No. Sympathy? No.
I have no desire in any bone in my body to ever deal with an addict on any kind of level again in my life.
They are 2 people in one body, one an addict screaming to be fed and the other is the soul fighting to be free.
Perhaps you'll come across the one that wants to be free and when you try to help them you discover that there are no empty beds in a treatment facility they can afford.
I actually don't automatically detest all drug seekers. I do detest the rude ones, the ones that suck up even a second of my time that they don't deserve, and ones that are sucking up vital resources that could be used for patients who are sick.
Drug seekers who are understanding, patient and nice (few and far between, but they exist) have my empathy and patience. (Think people who have become addicted to pain medication r/t a chronic disease or cancer.) Withdrawing from opiates IS painful.
But the ones that are on the call bell every 2 seconds, the ones demanding a specific drug and dose, the ones who tell me to "slam it" and then call me a ****, *****, whore, and every other name under the sun when I don't, can go **** a tree.
Sad but true, some people are incapable of making "choices". Its not like they chose to be drug addicts. They didn't wake up one day and decide that they were going to get themselves hooked on their drug of choice, whether it be pain pills, crack, alcohol, nicotine or caffeine.
Some receptor in their brain decided for them, and that receptor screams for more and more of that lovely drug.
Do I have empathy for them? No. Sympathy? No.
I have no desire in any bone in my body to ever deal with an addict on any kind of level again in my life.
They are 2 people in one body, one an addict screaming to be fed and the other is the soul fighting to be free.
Perhaps you'll come across the one that wants to be free and when you try to help them you discover that there are no empty beds in a treatment facility they can afford.
I respectfully disagree.
I must give the drug seeker more credit than you. I consider them grown up individuals who live their lives in the way they CHOOSE. I don't like the victim mentality that excuses inexcusable behavior. "I can't help it because my brain receptors are telling me to go get a hit." Your theory minimizes the strength of the human spirit and the capacity for change that all of us possess. Drug seekers are exactly where they CHOOSE to be, because it's easier and more pleasurable than slogging through a day cold turkey like the rest of us.
I will concede that they may not like their life.
That they wish things were different.
But they enjoy the high of the drug more than living a decent life, and that is the path they CHOOSE.
At some point they had a choice and it led to another and another. No snowflake ever believes that it is responsible for the avalanche. It is not just one bad choice that leads to the road to addiction it is a series of bad choices. I believe that every one has the right to be an idiot but do not want to pay for their stupidity.
i know what you mean....and sometimes i just want to call them out on it and tell them i know they are really just druggies. i got a patient from the ER a few weeks ago who came in with abd pain and rectal bleeding. or so she says. this lady is such a frequent flyer/med seeker that she has a special care plan in the ER. as soon as she got to the floor i went in to do vitals and admit her. she was on the phone speaking in some kind of code language and when she saw me come in the room she said to whoever she was talking to "i cant talk right now, the nurse is here." so kind of gave me the hint she was doing a drug deal or was up to no good. i couldnt even introduce myself before she asked for her 2mg of dilaudid. i told her i had to get her admitted first and i had no orders from the doctor yet. she immediately broke into sobs and said she was promised 2mg of dilaudid when she got up here. i ignored her and did her admission, paged the doctor for orders. while im waiting for the doc to call back shes pressing the call light asking again for dilaudid. told her i was waiting to hear from the doc and she starts freaking out about how its not fair to keep people waiting who are in pain, blah blah blah. the doctor calls me back and guess what...orders 0.5mg dilaudid. so i go in to give it to her, start pushing it and she asks me how much it is. I say 0.5mg. she says POINT FIVE??? POINT FIVE?!?!? starts yelling at me. I said "thats what the doctor ordered so thats what you get, im sorry." well shes sobbing and talking on and on about how shes getting treated and demanding to see the doctor RIGHT NOW. thankfully that was the end of my shift and i got to pass her on to the night shift nurse. later that night though the doctor did end up changing her medicine to 2mg and gave her a fentanyl patch after she said the 2mg still wasnt enough. Well they had to rapid response her in the middle of the night because she ATE the fentanyl patch and was nonresponsive, pupils fixed, and respirations were 6 per minute. Some Narcan woke her right up but just goes to show you cant give in to these people because once they get their way they wont stop.
Awful...so what happened after the narcan? Did she still get her 2mg of dilaudid? did that teach her a lesson why sometimes we don't over medicate?? Just reading that whole story makes me sad that people have gotten this way. What did they do before the almighty dilaudid?? I have to say it sounds like you handled her very well! :)
KSU-SN
70 Posts
i know what you mean....and sometimes i just want to call them out on it and tell them i know they are really just druggies. i got a patient from the ER a few weeks ago who came in with abd pain and rectal bleeding. or so she says. this lady is such a frequent flyer/med seeker that she has a special care plan in the ER. as soon as she got to the floor i went in to do vitals and admit her. she was on the phone speaking in some kind of code language and when she saw me come in the room she said to whoever she was talking to "i cant talk right now, the nurse is here." so kind of gave me the hint she was doing a drug deal or was up to no good. i couldnt even introduce myself before she asked for her 2mg of dilaudid. i told her i had to get her admitted first and i had no orders from the doctor yet. she immediately broke into sobs and said she was promised 2mg of dilaudid when she got up here. i ignored her and did her admission, paged the doctor for orders. while im waiting for the doc to call back shes pressing the call light asking again for dilaudid. told her i was waiting to hear from the doc and she starts freaking out about how its not fair to keep people waiting who are in pain, blah blah blah. the doctor calls me back and guess what...orders 0.5mg dilaudid. so i go in to give it to her, start pushing it and she asks me how much it is. I say 0.5mg. she says POINT FIVE??? POINT FIVE?!?!? starts yelling at me. I said "thats what the doctor ordered so thats what you get, im sorry." well shes sobbing and talking on and on about how shes getting treated and demanding to see the doctor RIGHT NOW. thankfully that was the end of my shift and i got to pass her on to the night shift nurse. later that night though the doctor did end up changing her medicine to 2mg and gave her a fentanyl patch after she said the 2mg still wasnt enough. Well they had to rapid response her in the middle of the night because she ATE the fentanyl patch and was nonresponsive, pupils fixed, and respirations were 6 per minute. Some Narcan woke her right up but just goes to show you cant give in to these people because once they get their way they wont stop.