I have HAD IT with customer service and press-gayney. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! Lately at work , I do the basics and make a nice introduction but anything else I refuse (the backrubs promised in the brochure, the menu seletion, the encouragement of 24 hour visiting). All i want to do is do my job, and go home. This Customer is alway right and Healthy Patients are Happy Patients has burned me out to the point of tears. I snapped at my boss a few weeks ago when she told me of a complaint that I was not Happy enough - I said "Who on EARTH is happy and manic with energy at 4am?"
Patients are PATIENTS! They are not our guests! This is not a hotel. Personally, I would rather the hospital be old school style - that would be encouragement enough for early ambulation post surgery and even quicker d/c.
I have had enough of this customer service mentality - staff deserve better.
As a nurse I have recently been reprimanded for this kind of "customer service" bs. I had a patient who actually needed lots of attention-he was just told he was going to die... all alone in his room, no family was with him, no support for him after the doc had gone. He needed my support and I gave it to him. I sat with him and cried with him and later his family. This took lots of time away from my other 4 patients and I was written up because a patient's "perceived" that I was being short with her. In reality I was so behind because I was trying to be a good nurse to this family who so desperately needed it that I was racing like crazy because you know we get in trouble for clocking out late too. I've had enough too.
I can understand nurses getting written up for being rude to patients or families. I think it's appropriate to have nurses written up if their attitudes are so bad that patient care suffers.
I believe it's asinine to write someone up because he wasn't happy or perky enough at 4 AM or because she was "short" with someone else because she was with a patient who was dying alone.
Anybody ever read "Code Green" by Dana Beth Weinberg? The subtitle says it all: "Money-Driven Hospitals and the Dismantling of Nursing."
Money grubbing b*stards. They care more about warm chocolate chip cookies and giving the IMPRESSION of actually caring about patients while in reality they don't give a d*mn about anything except profit. Who cares if people get sicker in the hospital or die? All that matters is the PERCEPTION that everybody's happy, happy, HAPPY and that profits are sky high.
If socialized medicine is the only answer to this insanity, BRING IT ON!
As a nurse I have recently been reprimanded for this kind of "customer service" bs. I had a patient who actually needed lots of attention-he was just told he was going to die... all alone in his room, no family was with him, no support for him after the doc had gone. He needed my support and I gave it to him. I sat with him and cried with him and later his family. This took lots of time away from my other 4 patients and I was written up because a patient's "perceived" that I was being short with her. In reality I was so behind because I was trying to be a good nurse to this family who so desperately needed it that I was racing like crazy because you know we get in trouble for clocking out late too. I've had enough too.
What you did is Amazing and thats what being a GOOD NURSE is!
Its a shame that you got written for that, im sure if that other pt was told they were going to die maybe then they would be more understanding.
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
i have had it with customer service and press-gayney. enough is enough! lately at work , i do the basics and make a nice introduction but anything else i refuse (the backrubs promised in the brochure, the menu seletion, the encouragement of 24 hour visiting). all i want to do is do my job, and go home. this customer is alway right and healthy patients are happy patients has burned me out to the point of tears. i snapped at my boss a few weeks ago when she told me of a complaint that i was not happy enough - i said "who on earth is happy and manic with energy at 4am?"
patients are patients! they are not our guests! this is not a hotel. personally, i would rather the hospital be old school style - that would be encouragement enough for early ambulation post surgery and even quicker d/c.
i have had enough of this customer service mentality - staff deserve better.
once upon a time, we took care of patients, we didn't "serve" "clients." we had decent staffing and the patients weren't as sick as they are now, so there was time for back rubs. families were respectful of the nursing staff and wouldn't dream of assaulting, insulting, abusing or disrespecting us. the customer service mentality has engendered the attitude that the "client is always right," and that is soooo wrong!
Specializes in Acute Care Cardiac, Education, Prof Practice.
I would love to know how many of you work at Magnet Hospitals. Just out of curiosity, because we have been Magnet for over twelve years and have none of these ridiculous restrictions on us.
Knock Magnet as a hoop jumping joke, but I would rather sit on committees and fill out extra paperwork than be demoralized with some of the examples you folks have made.
And what of that wafting scent of fresh baked cookies? Am I supposed to offer them to my non-diabetic patients & tell the diabetics "sorry, you can't have any?" (that should fly like a lead balloon).
Or, am I to bake regular & sugar free cookies? Do I serve them with milk, coffee, tea? (Where is the fine china, I saw it just the other day.....)
Good God, what happened to the business of saving lives?
I think that's great, Tweety, because your hospital has people to do this. The problem arises when admins expect nursing staff to do all the customer service things, like your example, wearing silly buttons, and doing things that have no relation to actually caring for the patient's illness/injury. Whent "customer service" is expected to be the priority over patient care, that's when nurses are getting upset.
Trust me...I know exactly what you're saying. I'm a nurse advocate with the battle scars to prove it. Baking cookies should never take precidence over patient safety or even basic care. Hospitals are not hotels and patients sometimes need to be told that.
I think the problem is rooted sometimes in a system that treats patients like cattle , with people talking around them and not to them, with rude people saying "that's not my patient", doctors coming in and out, not talking to the patient, nurses saying "because the doctor ordered it...." on and on and on. People have had enough of shoddy attitudes and care. I know I pay too high a price for my insurance, co-pays, etc. not to be treated with respect when I see my doctor or if I'm ever an inpatient. No I don't expect to be served bon bons.
My dentist one time kept me waiting over an hour and the staff was rude about it. Guess what...I left and never came back.
If your hospital expects you to sacrifice patient care, then a call to Joint Commission might be in order
Most customer service activities can be incorporated in people's routine. Not in the place of patient care. Little tihngs can make all the difference...if everyone...housekeeping, respiratory, the admitting clerk, doctors takes a look at themselves.
Trust me word of mouth gets around. There's several hospitals around here I woundn't send my worst enemy to. I want to work at the place people want to be at.
In some ways I can't stand it. In another, I think it's good that people are being held accountable.
Ummm... all you guys realize, the smiles, "cookies", the back-rubs; they're for a reason. Patients have a choice. I give foot rubs, leg rubs, back rubs. I itch where it itches. I print out maps/directions of good restaurants for my vacationing families. I talk about politics, sports, families. I make extra runs to the nourishment room if they decided they like vanilla pudding slightly more than chocolate pudding.
My patients (customers) come back, they like that.
I just came from oriantation. WE started @9:00 and finish @5:00. All of us didn't get chance to eat breakfast the HR told us we will break for lunch @1:30. This is along time can you imagine that the HR was not happy cause we lost our smile. HE said "see how easy is it to loose our smile" . Are you dum we are hungry we are humans. No one smils when he is hungry and dizzy. Customer serviece is smiling " no it is quality service". I can smile all day and abuse my PT, never chang them How about that!!!!!!!!!!!! To all HR out there back off from our backs we got enogh. Leave us alone : WE are not going to smile all day , cause we are tierd" LEAVE us alone. MOSt of us are very very good nurses This is customer service . Why smiling when there is nothing funny to smile about. FAKE smiles
Amen to that sister.. I have been saying that for years... Gotta love the "customer Service" angle of these hospitals. We as staff will always be in the wrong. I have worked at some hospitals that even had staff on other floors BAKING chocolate chip cookies on the floor to give it a home feel. I am a nurse, I save lives. Not baking cookies at midnight so that the pts will feel more at home.
Sure, let's bake cookies so the aroma can torture the pts who are NPO!!
I can just smell those cookies while cleaning up after a GI bleed!
For pete's sake, we'd get in trouble with JHACO just for having a toaster, let alone an oven!!!
we just had another class regarding HCAHPS because our scores are not high enough and since we are an almost entirely medicaid/medicare facility, that hits us where it hurts i suppose. although our core measures are patient outcomes are excellent, our scores are not. yet, i truly in my heart of hearts believe it is because of the patient population that i serve.
our patients have become non other than guests at a hotel. in my short time as a nurse, i have learned that "returning the patient to their higher level of functioning" seems to have gone out the window. encouragement of independence is not the way to go, because it makes us as the nurse seem lazy, rude, etc to say to the patient "let's see if you can feed yourself this morning".... i had a patient throw his glucerna at me, because he said he couldn't use his hands or his arms to hold it, but he sure could throw it! to attempt to get the patient out of bed, when they just "don't want to", and the nurse is being so mean to ask them to try and move those legs and expand those lungs. and god forbid the doctor changes the order for their pain medication, then you're really on the top of their list.
it's so much more complex than "the man" makes it out to be. our hospital is now saying, do not use the golden rule--do unto others as you'd like done unto you. use the platinum rule--treat others as THEY want to be treated. so, if mr. smith wants you to wipe his bum simply because he does not feel like it, that's what you do--which encourages longer hospital stay and dependence on the staff.
i don't mind getting a cup of coffee for a family member, or a snack for a patient, or giving a back rub when i have time... but because of budget cuts, i have eight patients, who get sicker and sicker by the day, most of them belong in the ICU but because our ICU is always full of gunshots, stabbings and MVAs , the more stable, titrating dopamine, freshly vent-weaned patients are on PCU with me.. and i have 8 of them. i have more than once been working a code or a rapid response and had a patient or their family member walk in the room demanding a cup of ice and wanting to know what's taking so long. i know to them that is their emergency, but it goes beyond entitlement at that point.
most of the times i work i feel as though my license is on the line. i provide the best care i can give but there is only so much i can do.. because now not only am i a nurse, maid, concierge, waitress and mediator. our staff is spread so thin it's amazing that our patient outcomes are as exceptional as they are. and we are always expected to smile.
i actually burst into tears the other night at work. i was so overwhelmed, frustrated, all of the above. the people i served at cracker barrel were much more appreciative... and all i was doing was serving lemonade and country fried steak, not attempting to save their lives and help them return to the way they were before their hospital stay.
administration has sent up hall way police now to watch us give report at the bedside (which if you ask me, is horse hooves, because it's a total invasion of privacy) and make sure our call lights are answered. i am not in kindergarten. and if i walk by a call light, i usually have a very good reason for doing so.
anyway, i'm glad i am not the only one who feels this way.
unfortunately, nothing is going to change for us unless we nurses stand up for ourselves. this is not why i became a nurse. going to work for myself and the other nurses on my floor has become quite a nightmare. it's not that i don't love what i do, it's that i feel like i am giving so much of myself when i am there for those 12 hours that it's killing me.
but as long as the CMA are controlling all the reimbursements to the hospitals, this is not going to get better.... and i have a feeling private insurance is right behind them.....
I would love to know how many of you work at Magnet Hospitals. Just out of curiosity, because we have been Magnet for over twelve years and have none of these ridiculous restrictions on us.
Knock Magnet as a hoop jumping joke, but I would rather sit on committees and fill out extra paperwork than be demoralized with some of the examples you folks have made.
Respectfully,
Tait
The hospital I work at wants to go for Magnet status; our only obstacle (we're pretty close, actually) is that we are part of a Catholic network, and the sisters "in charge" really don't care if we have Magnet or not....so if they don't approve us to apply for it, not much we can do.
We see plenty of the "customer service" crap, too. NOT to the extent of baking cookies, but even so. The cookie thing kills me, can't imagine even that scent is welcome to nauseated post op patients. Would be maddening to NPO patients, etc. What a ridiculous notion! Good gawd.
OP, I am with you on SO many points. The good basics of healthcare have gone to the wayside to accomodate ridiculous patient requests and desires. Even the level of CARE they expect can be ridiculous, and I wonder where they get the ideas that they do....I had a patient a while back who was 17 and there for a jaw abscess, and her mom thought we should be with her every time she got out of bed to go to the bathroom or walk in the halls. Um, you weren't admitted with broken feet, you can get up and walk on your own! A patient just the other day (not mine, but I heard about it) didn't think the CNA could get them up, they thought an RN had to be present. What exactly do they think the CNA's DO?!?! These kinds of things drive me nuts, and I have noticed a HUGE change over the last few years in their expectations.
I don't mind giving back rubs at TIMES, to me that can do a lot to increase a patient's comfort level, whether they're sore, or itchy from the linens. They can be sitting up on the side of the bed, getting in or out, and I'll ask if they want a back rub (granted, that's not an every patient, every day thing, but if they comment about their backs, I'll often ask if they want a quick back rub). When they want all kinds of special food in the middle of the night (like, making them a MALT or some dumb crap) that kills me. I don't have the time (or the resources, or the ... knowledge of how) to make malts.
I think back to how it was like when I started as an RN (I was a CNA for 5 years prior to, in an NH; I work in a hospital now) and am amazed, with how we staffed then, how I ever could have been "busy" or had a "bad day," lol. I would give anything to go back to that!
Agree 100% that they are PATIENTS and not CUSTOMERS. Of course I still think they are human beings, but their role while they are in the hospital is patient, not guest or client or whatever euphemism that management comes up with.
KyPinkRN
283 Posts
As a nurse I have recently been reprimanded for this kind of "customer service" bs. I had a patient who actually needed lots of attention-he was just told he was going to die... all alone in his room, no family was with him, no support for him after the doc had gone. He needed my support and I gave it to him. I sat with him and cried with him and later his family. This took lots of time away from my other 4 patients and I was written up because a patient's "perceived" that I was being short with her. In reality I was so behind because I was trying to be a good nurse to this family who so desperately needed it that I was racing like crazy because you know we get in trouble for clocking out late too. I've had enough too.