Withholding prns??!!

Nurses General Nursing

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I have never in my nursing career been so angry!!

That said I need advice. I work on an acute Ventilator unit where pain and anxiety reign supreme. After dealing with 2 pts who were in such a state that one was ripping her skin to shreds and the other was pulling at her trach/trach tubing so badly that the tubing and HME were filled with frank blood.

After trying relaxation, diversional and communiction techniques to no avail (done by myself, resp therapy, 2 other nurses & the CNAs) I asked the med nurse (A float, unfamiliar with the floor) if they were due for their prn meds.

Ready? She told me that the off going med nurse had told her under NO circumstances were these pts to be given their prns!!

:(

I showed her the MD order, I showed her the VS I had taken other than the normal elevations you would expect to see with pain/anxiety they were stable & then I told her that she needed to use her own nursing judgement at which point she started to cry. ( I still feel like a turd) She did give them at my request with a positive effect inside half an hour.

I then went to the Nursing Supv. explained the situation & she asked me to write it up. I explained that this would be a fruitless gesture as the offgoing nurse is favored by my UM. This nurse gets away with yelling, swearing ( daily ) and has even thrown the med keys at other nurses. Withholding prns is not new for her, she has been seen telling pts no she will NOT give then pain meds as they are NOT in pain.

In the end I did write it up & gave a copy to the nursing supv & the DON, bypassing my UM. However I know that I have effectively put my head on the chopping block. I know there will be hell to pay from my UM no questions asked.Her response to our various complaints r/t this nurse is always "oh thats just her way", "Oh, thats our girl". How much more frustrating can you get??!!

I know in my heart I did the right thing. On further investigation it was discovered she had given the same directives to another float nurse.

Other than letting me vent, TY. I would like to know if anyone has any idea if this is a state reportable offense? besides the fact I don't think that there will be any repurcussions for her, only me.....This whole thing has really gotten to me & I want to make sure that I do everything I should but I don't want anger to cloud my judgement!

as stated & regardless of what country u live in, incidents like that need reporting through the full chain of command

the float nurse isn't just caught in the middle, she needs her butt kicked as well, don't feel sorry for her, tears included

Felix

Don't feel like a turd ... the nurse you made cry needed to cry. She was stupid to accept such a request from the nurse leaving her shift. Geez ... that is horrible. Not to mention illegal.

:nono:

It's terrible that you were put in this situation, but you did the right thing. These poor patients.

As for other instances, it stinks that you are being told, "that's our girl" etc..........I would be so mad too.

I have a nurse that hates giving out any prn pain meds/tranqs etc...She happens to be the regular full-time nurse on the floor and is best friends with DON(not that it should matter but...). There have been many times that this nurse tells the oncoming nurse, "don't give her/him any percocet or valium, just give tylenol"......Huh? Give tylenol for anxiety/agitation???? I tell her that I will see how the patient is first.......A few times, when she comes in the next day, she takes a fit, yelling, "who gave so and so this or that?". I don't know how or why she gets away with this, really I don't. Our patients come first, and secondly, who the hell is she to insult us other nurses by telling us what to give and what not to give? I have seen patients that are in severe pain and the nurse is giving them tylenol instead of a prn pain med.......I have confronted 2 such nurses and asked them, "why aren't you giving them a pain pill"......believe this or not, but here are the answers given. "so and so, said not to give the strong pain meds, to give tylenol"....... Once, I blew up......"did you assess their pain?"......."you are their nurse right now, not so and so".......I just don't get it.

I hope that there are not many nurses out there that are like this. Those who are, need to be reeducated on pain control/psych meds..........actually maybe they should be out of nursing period.

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.

Boy, do I ever agree, Jude !

Whassup with that thinking, anyway? WHY do they do this? I just don't GET it....:confused:

Specializes in Med/Surg, Ortho.

This whole senerio makes me wonder if the med count is actually accurate. This kind of smacks of a diversion scheme to me.

And it isnt right and your UM and med nurse know it, so whats their excuse, and whats next on the list if they are that uncaring and torturous.

Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Whew - don't get me started on the subject of people who shouldn't be nurses! Give me a break! Report these people and I mean both of the nurses (the one who gave the order and the one who followed it). In Illinois, we have long term care ombudsman who follow all non-hospital care placements. Please think of how many other times this nurse (the one who gave the order) has done this???!!!!! Please, for these poor patients write it up! Believe me, if one of my family members had prn meds with held without a solid medical reason, the entire facility (including the company who owns it) would be on the chopping block. You are following your conscience - go with it. Take care.

When I was in nursing school back in the old days, my instructor called the nurses who didn't like to give out PRN pain meds "The Keeper of the Keys". They held the keys to the Demerol and Morphine etc... and they KNEW your patient wasn't in THAT much pain. I am in the position now and when the patient says they are in pain (even though I work in Psych), and if they have a PRN order and if it isn't soo soon, I give the PRN. If the Doctor didn't want anything given, he wouldn't have written the order. And if he didn't write the order and the patient c/o pain, I call and get them an order.

Specializes in Community Health Nurse.

Where I work, if a patient says they are in pain, they are in pain.......medicate as prescribed no matter what.

If they want their pain meds changed or increased, get the order and give them their drugs.

If the family of the patient says they are in pain and you disagree because it wasn't the patient himself/herself saying "I'm in pain"....it becomes a PR issue because the family member trots up...no...storms up to the Nurses station in search of "whose boss that shift" to report you as a noncaring insensitive excuse of a human being.

Our hospital is big on pain management. I am big on medicating them for pain when the patient...not the family member...says they need or want something for pain.

What bothers me are the drug seekers who are known drug addicts still using. I think our hospital becomes those patients crutch for continued drug abuse because they will give them the Ativan, the Morphine IV every 2 to 4 hours, the Vicodin, the Percocet, etc.

In your patients case however, you were right to do what you did, and the other person was stone wrong.

Well if she does, calmly remind her that there are whistle blowers laws in many states now, NY being one of them, and if there is any retaliation against you for blowing the whistle on this nurse as you were obligated to do to protect your pt, your manager's actions against you can cause the hospital to be sued. And they wont be too happy about that.

Also, I too was wondering about the narcotics counts.

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.

The pain is what the patient SAYS it is. Period. Withholding pain meds further deteriorates the patient's condition by the body having to deal with or fight against the pain.. slows the healing process.

Watched an interesting report on TV not too long ago on how ppl's brains respond individually and differently to pain, and how it is indeed so very INDIVIDUAL. And that pain should/MUST be treated according to what the patient states it is.

This really ticks me off. As said above.. wonder how often and in how many places this goes on?

1. This is reportable. I would especially report it to my S. BON since this is an ongoing offence by this nurse.

2. The ONLY nurse who may give an order to withhold medications to another RN, is an advanced practice nurse. Then the order must be written and signed. However, If your state does not grant prescriptive powers to an APN, then even she can't do this.

3. The float nurse was in the wrong for not advocating for the patient, and for allowing another RN to direct her paractice. If a decisions is made to withhold a med it must be reported to the MD. If a prn is preceived necessary and is withheld it must be reported to the MD.

4. Withholding prn's under these circumstances violates the standared of practice and any state board will have to respond.

5. Report to BON because this is the agency who can and will disapline individual nurses.

6. You may want to report to other agencies as you deem appropriate such as JACHO, etc. but definately the BON.

Common protochol for going up the Chain of Command is you need to notify every link in the chain that you are proceeding up the chain. So you would have done well to tell the firstline supervisor that you were going to take this up the chain. Sometimes we don't want to discuss an issue with a first line supervisor (because the problem is the supervisor)but you need to tell them that and that you are going to their supervisor with the problem instead.

Taking a problem to you supervisor is the first step. You are always free to move beyound that if you do not get satisfaction. Your credibility and professionalism come up though if you skip a link.

I am guessing that the supervisor has a vested interest in protecting the offending nurse. Maybe personal maybe not. It could just be she is afraid of loosing someone that she feels will be hard to replace. Or she doesn't want to offend her because the supervisor is the type that has to have everyone like her.

See what your BON says about reporting. Are you obligated to report or do they want you to take it up the chain first.

As far as JACHO and various state agencies go it is customary to report to the chain of command first then to the agency. However, if this is ongoing and unresolved report it yourself.

Originally posted by PJMommy

The behavior this nurse is displaying is unexcusable. Orders to not give pain meds...without any explanation as to why...is absolutely ridiculous.

And illegal. M.D.s have been disaplined for this.

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