Discharge of patients protocol

[lavender girl]

Dear all student nurses

especially those that can remember back to the days when they may have been an assistant nurse.

I need to help reflect on a problem I have recently thought of again due the problem occurring again.

Back in 1999 when I worked as an assistant nurse, with what I might add very little training if any on a very understaffed and chaotic ward! I was very inexperienced at the time and not aware to any real proocols of the ward, due to lack of communication on that ward and no team breifing sessions!

This patient was an elderly man , approx 70 years old and do not know what he had come in for, as it was the first time I had seen him. That evening I was covering all the observation with approx the whole ward, i.e 40 patients! scary?. Anyway he told me that as he was verbally discharged by the doctor and waiting for his lift to turn up that there was no point in doing his bp but out of instict and generosity at the time! I still did it (even when the patients go of the ward I will still make it my business to try and go back to them at the neorificet point poss to try and ensure the bp is taken, which some nurses said "its their business if they go off the ward when they know their bp is to be taken, just log on the chart "off the ward, unable to take!". These comments I never agreed with and still went back if I remembered.

This in its self tells you what sort of attitudes some of the staff had that worked on that ward!

Anyway going back to this man again I took his bp, but he started laughing quite heartily whilst I was taking it, but felt awkward in telling him otherwise at that time! The bp cam up higher than any of his immedate recent bp readings, so I looked back on the previous page and found one bp that was almost this high too. As this was the case and taking into account that laughing can put your bp up by approx at leat 5-10 on the systolic especially (i've noticed) I thought well together with the fact hes allowed to go home also it should be ok!

Approx 2 -3 weeks later I overheard another nurse saying that this man had died of a stroke!, I was absolutely devestated but looking back did try to do things in good faith and was not educated otherwise, so although it has taught me a very valuable lesson, I would like to heal properly from this past memory

Could any of you be very honest to compare this incident to a similar experience or were you HONESTLY? awre of this protocol?

I do hope this is helping other peolple not to repeat the same mistake as it is a very awful feeling to have this on your conscience! Please send me a private message if you do not want any one else to see your reply

Much appreciated love Tara.

[RNonsense]

ummmm...deja vu? Did we not have this question before? Or am I losing me marbles......?

[lavender girl]

in reply to you devastatingly intellegent and unobserving comment, this thread was last posted on the allnurses noticeboard, not student nurses, i might add!

any how i was hoping to hear an intelligent reply to my enquiry, from the same type of length of experience as my self.

sorry if im boring you, maybe there is other student nurses that dont look at the threads on the all nurses forum, ever thought of that at all?

im english anyway so i dont eat corn and chees or get wind!

thankyou for your time