Anybody else had frustrating experiences caring for patients or their family members who are nurses?
Don't get me wrong--the majority of the nurse patients/families I've cared for are very understanding and delightful to work with. However, it really grinds my gears when we have families whose nursing experience is vastly different from the specialty that they're admitted to, and yet they consistently second-guess and undermine the staff because they think that they know better.
I would never walk into an OR and try to tell an OR nurse how to do their job (or any other specialty in which I have literally zero background). I don't understand how anyone can think that is remotely appropriate.
I honestly think that these families can be harder to teach and work with than non-medical families; in some cases, they know just enough to think that they know what they're talking about, when in reality they completely misunderstand what's happening. Even more frustrating, some of these patients/families don't want to be taught because they're convinced that they already know everything (or worse, they dig their heels in because they don't want to concede that they were wrong in the first place). In addition, when they're dissatisfied about the care (even if they don't understand the situation), they encourage other relatives to 'advocate' by questioning the care, too (at which point you have somebody with no healthcare background/knowledge insisting that they know better than you); now Uncle Bob the mechanic is standing over your shoulder telling you that he 'doesn't like the way that IV looks.' It devolves into this painfully adversarial, no-win process.
Above all, it drives me nuts when these patients/families have entirely unrealistic expectations about their care. For instance, you can't demand that the doctor/provider call to update you every hour. I could understand that request from a layperson (I mean, we still aren't going to do it), but surely, as a nurse, you realize that that's a wildly unreasonable expectation, right? I've seen nurse patients/families perform certain behaviors where I find myself literally shaking my head and thinking, "You should know better."
I've seen this in family members with all kinds of medical backgrounds (EKG/rad techs, CNAs, doctors, etc.) but I see it so often with nurses. As I said, the vast majority of nurse patients/families I've cared for have been amazing, and their background has been a huge asset. However, I can say with absolute certainty that some of my worst, most exasperating patients/family members have been nurses, too.
She said “I’m an RN and you can just stop talking now.”
"Oh good, then you already know this" would have been my exact reply with the most sickening sweet smile that I could muster.
I have a patient in my clinic that claims that he's dating the nurse manager of one of the local ICUs. I don't think he realizes that I lunch often with the nurse manager of that unit. His girlfriend is the unit secretary for one of the med/surg units. I found that out when I asked my friend and she asked around
Specializes in Psych, Corrections, Med-Surg, Ambulatory.
2 hours ago, Wuzzie said:
I, just recently, had a patient that requested I use a large cuff on her because a smaller one gives “too high a reading”. I explained to her that I would use the correct size cuff ( regular adult) in order to get an accurate reading. A too large one reads low and a too small one reads high. She said “I’m an RN and you can just stop talking now.” What a nasty creature. Kinda wanted to kick her in the shin.
Wouldn't a real nurse understand the importance of knowing what her blood pressure actually is?
I took care of a patient one night who's daughter was a nurse manager on a L&D floor at another hospital. We were a cardiovascular PCU. She demanded I call the ATTENDING GENERAL SURGEON at 0200 to discuss the secretions that were coming out of her NG tube. Then she decided mom had sepsis (???) and demanded that I take mom's temperature every hour.
Also had another lovely daughter of another patient that told every provider that walked through the door that she was an oncology nurse. She eventually "fired" me from dad's care that night because I "wasn't attentive enough." Eventually we found out she's a medical assistant in a clinic.
So what does one do when the guests of a patient are interfering in the care of the patient? At what point do we tell them they need to go? It seems to me if they are your patient you should have some recourse.
Worst experience I’ve had was the daughter of my pt was a nursing lecturer. She liked to quiz staff, trying to find any knowledge deficits to make them feel incompetent. Demanded care immediately. even when she could obviously see how busy I was, My pt were in a shared room. If we didn’t answer the call bell instantly she would complain and make a big scene. Go on that the doctors aren’t doing enough. Worst family member I’ve ever had to deal with!! Nothing was good enough for her. Every little thing was criticized, she liked feeling like she had power over the staff because she was lecturer and we were just med/surg floor nurses.
Or the new grad who is a month into orientation, LOL. If you wouldn’t behave this way in front of your preceptor, perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate your behavior.
It’s been a pretty eye-opening experience, and it’s caused me to be a lot more thoughtful about how I present myself and work with the team when my family is hospitalized (above all expressing appreciation and gratitude for our awesome nurses).
Worse than the new grad is the nursing STUDENT! ?♀️
I took care of a patient one night who's daughter was a nurse manager on a L&D floor at another hospital. We were a cardiovascular PCU. She demanded I call the ATTENDING GENERAL SURGEON at 0200 to discuss the secretions that were coming out of her NG tube. Then she decided mom had sepsis (???) and demanded that I take mom's temperature every hour.
Also had another lovely daughter of another patient that told every provider that walked through the door that she was an oncology nurse. She eventually "fired" me from dad's care that night because I "wasn't attentive enough." Eventually we found out she's a medical assistant in a clinic.
Reminds me of the nursing home nursing assistant family member who along with her constant criticism of every ‘incompetent’ nurse who took care of her child, announced she was installing cameras in the home so she could catch said incompetent nurses and have evidence for her lawsuit(s). That did it for me. I got out of there.
Haha- bringing back memories. Many years ago I worked in an outpatient primary care pediatric clinic and we had this one family with a very demanding, very high-maintenance mom. She always arrived in a huff, barked at the front desk, talked about how things were done "at her practice", asked for things not usually done, etc., etc. You know the type I am talking about. Anyway, she came in one day with her kid asking for all kinds of lab tests , saying "his clinical presentation was consistent with X". The doctor finally humored her and ran a CBC. Completely normal. She asked to see it and then went off about how it was in fact NOT normal and started commenting on specific values. The pediatrician was like "I promise you this is a normal CBC". She insisted she was a "medical professional and knew these results were abnormal". Come to find out she was a VETERINARY TECHNICIAN ? The doctor actually said to her "wrong species. if he were a dog I would be concerned" ? She never pulled that nonsense again!
On the other end of the spectrum, I was that family member this year.
My 86 year old grandma was hospitalized for weeks and losing weight because of no appetite.
When I visited, she said she'd been hungry for days but only wanted bread products because she thought she could keep them down. She said her nurse/the hospital cafeteria refused.
I asked the nurse about her diet, and she told me she couldn't eat a roll because she was in a fib/CHF and on a cardiac diet. I asked since when patients on cardiac diets can't eat a piece of bread and asked if she could please fix whatever was needed for my grandma to eat... Nope. She kept saying "but that's what's ordered. It says cardiac diet." I kept saying "but no, that's not what's ordered if shes on a cardiac diet."
I know my thoughts were probably apparent on my face, and I'm sure she left thinking "ugh, nurse family members." I called my aunt to bring my grandma what she wanted.
When they start explaining things to me I usually tell them I'm a nurse. That's just so they don't have to work so hard to be clear when I already understand. I then follow by saying I have no experience in that particular specialty, so they know where I'm at.
I agree the ones making the biggest noise about being nurses usually aren't.
Agreed. If I'm with the patient (it's a family member of mine) I'm usually quiet unless the staff start explaining things and then I let them know I'm a nurse so they don't have to start at Step One. If it's me who's the patient and I'm answering the barrage of questions then it's a lot harder to hide that I'm a nurse because of course I'm specific in my terms so we can just get to it already LOL. In taking my child to a new medical office for the first time, a new provider, I gave a social history like *I* would want one and of course he asked me if I was a nurse; he wished he got concise details like that from every Mom!
When I worked the floor it used to bug me that the person announcing "I'm in the medical field" or "medical profession" was 100% of the time found out to be an EMT, a nursing aid, a medical assistant. None of which was relevant to the condition or care of their family member in the bed.
This thread reminds me of a patient who had a family member who visited daily, she wasn't normally in this person's life but as she had traveled to see him she was now visiting him on his unexpected hospital stay. She made sure we all knew she was a DOCTOR, she asked to be called Dr. Smith, and that she wanted to be kept abreast of all medical decisions and changes. Never mind that the patient in the bed was A+Ox3 and had adult cognitive capacity . It turned out that she had a doctorate (PhD) in (I think?) English, English Lit, something like that. She was fun. Really. ?
It devolves into this painfully adversarial, no-win process.
JKL33
7,043 Posts
I would like to add "?" to the kind of likes/reactions we can give.
And you get an award for not kicking and for not saying, "Ah! So you skipped skills lab!"