Please excuse the tone of this post but I need to vent before I deck a nurse!!!! In the last five days, I have lost three very dear patients. Oh course, at the end of each shift we give a status report. Resident No.1-Pain very severe, called Hospice and was authorized to increase Roxanol to 1ml. q 15 minutes until comfort was visible to me, then q hr, thereafter. When I told the oncoming nurse this in report, she blew up saying, "Well he's gonna die on my shift!". Very nasty, self centered B*****!!!! While I was finishing up my paperwork, she does rounds, comes stomping down the hall and pratically yells, "Well, he's dead!" I wanted to deck her but instead I kept my mouth closed, finished my nightly documentation and left. Anyone else, I would have gladly stayed and assisted with the final duties for this kind gentleman, but I knew if I stayed, we'd get into it, so I left. Two days later and resident number 2- Resident passed away at 9:45, which I am scheduled to leave at 10:00pm. Another LN was on duty, so my spouse and I stayed till 11:30, and took care of everything, and were there until the funeral home arrived. Most other nurses where we work would have said at 10:00pm, your shift, you take over but I am not like that, so I did what I could. Now for resident number three- night before last, he is screaming in pain, metastatic CA, 1ml. q. 15 minutes of Roxanol not even touching his pain. Again, I called and got permission to start a SQ Morphine pump at 30 mg. per hour, with a 10 mg bolus q. 15 minutes as needed. Nurse no. 1 comes on duty, takes reoprt and gain starts ranting and raving about how he'll die on her shift. I waited till the heffer left the hall, then I called my supervisor and told her unless she wanted to see me fired that night, she'd best get to the hall ASAP!!!!!! Which she did! I told my supervisor I had listened to enough of her self centered crap and if she came back to the unit before I left and started any more of her lipping off, I was gonna back her butt against the wall and blast her inconsiderate self. I was gonna tell her that I had seen road kill with more compassion and that if she has more concern for her level of workload than the level of pain in a dying man then she needed to get the heck outta dodge because if I heard her spouting off her big mouth like that again I was gonna take her into the dirty utility room, which has no windows, and kick her a$$, I have had it with her. My supervisor stayed on the hall till I completed my work and then I left. Yesterday, this dear man was still alive and "you know who" was scheduled to follow me. So, I asked the other nurse on the hall with me if we could say a simple prayer together that he would pass before our shift ended and she was more than in agreement because she had witnessed the IDIOTs behavior before. So we said a prayer. I imediately went down to cheeck on him and his precious DIL was reading him the Bible. The family was ready for him to be released and I did something I don't usually do in front of a family member, but I requested a few minutes alone with him because I have this song I sing to each of my residents when I feel their time is close. I guess I do it mostly for me. She asked if it would be okay if she stayed and it was not my decision to ask her to leave so I said yes. I bent down very close to his ear and I spoke to him about Jesus and the home he was about to go to. He and I had spoken of the Lord many times, then I sang the song for him. While I was singing, the DIL placed her hand into mine and when I was done, she cried and hugged me very tightly. I told her I'd be back soon but had to pass medications to other residents but to call me if she needed anything. Less than one hour later, she approached me with tears in her eyes and said, "He just left for Heaven". I went to the room and he was gone. We hugged each other so tight and she thanked me for all I had done and I walked away feeling that not only had his pain ended but our prayer had been answered and he did passs on my shift.
