Hurt on the job - who's caring for us?!

lindarn · Aug 12, 2004

Hello nurses....
I'm a nurse with a BSN...who was seriously hurt on the job. While working in the ICU I obtained a very virulant staph infection via an unknown papercut in my finger that entered my bloodstream and settled into my spine. This put me in the hospital for a very long time. I've had months of IV antibiotics that have made me so sick. And let's not even talk about the pain I've endured. Yes....I'm lucky to be alive and not paralyzed but I'm still relearning to walk again and can only hope the infection is really gone as there is no way to know.
Yes...we realize we work in a risky business and we take all the precautions we possibly can to minimize our risks. We put our lives on the line on a daily basis caring for others. Yet I've noticed that when we are hurt everyone turns there back on us. I personally have been denied my work comp claim for the simple reason that staph is everywhere and we carry it on our own bodies (I've heard of this happening to other nurses too) and in my state it takes many months for a hearing appeal and I have the burden of proof! Experienced medical professionals understand the different types of staph and the different virulant levels and I feel confident I will preval eventually but I'm just trying to find enough energy to recover my health and now I need to sum up enough energy to begin a long fight for rights I should have never been denied in the first place! And there are no benefits to help me while I'm unable to work! I've been cut off financially by my company.... ...yet must still make a $900 a month medical insurance payment so that my family has health insurance.....which I'm using up...as I'm finding that I have a new full time job just trying to get better so that I can get back to work. I'm scared to death that my disability could be permanent. I didn't go to college for six years and work so hard for a career just to loose it. All I wanted was my company to stand by me long enough for me to recover and get back to work....guess that was too much to ask!
And hear is the real kicker: I contacted the infection when working extra to help out on my day off!!! Most all nurses work overtime as there aren't enough of us to adequately staff our hospitals and other places of work. And I hear some places have mandatory overtime. With heavier patient loads and nursing shortages.....you would think those of us out there working so hard would be treated better....but I have found that NOT to be the case! :angryfire
I feel that people (nurses, doctors and other staff), hospitals, companies, and our politicians need to stand by nurses when we become hurt! Close the loopholes that allow these large companies to abuse their employees and treat us as a throw away commodity!
I would like to hear from any of you who have had similiar situations either yourself or with a coworker. What happened? Where you able to recover and did your company stand by you or not?
Anyone have any ideas on how we might change this?
PLEASE SHARE YOUR STORIES AND IDEAS FOR CHANGE!!!

First, let me tell you how sorry I am about your situation. It must be horrible. Now, have you contacted an L & I attorney yet? Please do so ASAP. L & I attorneys work on contingency, so you will not have to pay anything. All you will be responsible for is out of pocket expenses, example, for another MD, to testify on your behalf.

Were there patients there at the time that had a staph infection, or wound infection? if therer were, this could be documented.

The attorney could also contact an infectious disease MD to give expert opinion on the likelihood of you contracting this virulent of an infection. He or she would be the best source on information on wound infections.

You might also have him "leak" the story to the papers, how the hospital is turingn its back on its nursing staff when they get hurt from work. Tie it in to the nursing shortage, and how this is one of the reasons that nurses leave the profession. It is not enough the the work is backbreaking, but the risk of catching serious illnesses and the how your employer is truning its back on you. Make THEM look bad in public!! Most hospitals are sensitive to public opinion

That is my advice. But really, GET AN ATTORNEY ASAP!!

Linda Gusch, RN, BSN, CCRN

Spokane ,Washington.

Trvln Nurse, RN · Aug 12, 2004

Thanks Linda for your care and support.

First....I'm meeting with the first of many attorney's in an hour....I'm going to be meeting with several this week. I want to find a good one. Second....I don't work directly for a hospital....but for several via contracted employment with another company that I won't mention now until after I speak with an attorney. (But if the attorney says I can....I'll go public). It's not a hospital that let me down in this case....but my company which is a very large corporation that works thoughout the United States providing services to hospitals. Third, I think I can trace it back to a certain patient I came in contact with in the ICU. And because the staph I contacted was so aggressive....this wasn't something learking in my body for months....nor was it the type of staph we carry on our body as the company I work for is claiming.

Unfortunately, I've come into contact with several other nurses who've experienced similiar situations and ALL of their employeers (many hospitals) did not back them......using the same excuse....."elsewhere...not at work". Many nurses did not get help from their employeers because they couldn't trace their staph infection to a specific cause.

Yea right! If we could get this kind of virulant (very aggressive) penicillin resistant staph anywhere........people would be dying everywhere and those that survived would be walking (or wheelchairing) around with IV poles and antibotics for months. You just don't hear of it.......and you don't hear the nurses stories either. It all seems hush hush...... Afterall....it would be even more difficult to recruit employees to come work for you for low wages, no breaks, stressful environments......if you knew your live was really at risk everyday and if you did get hurt....you were cast out without any assistance, care or concern what so ever!

I want to hear from more nurses with similiar stories.....and any advice comments from any of you. I want this subject to come out of the dark and into the light. I want our employeers, and the public to hear outrage at this injustice to healthcare workers. Nurses stand by you.....you should stand by the nurses!!!!!

And yes....I'm angry.....it's a total betrayal!!!:angryfire

hipab4hands · Aug 13, 2004

And yes....I'm angry.....it's a total betrayal!!!:angryfire

No One looks after our best interests, except ourselves. When work related injuries occur, Worker's Comp will try and find every excuse not to treat you.

I currently have a repetive motion type injury in both hands. In our work unit , it's not an uncommon injury. Occ Med will not treat me or do an evaluation, unless I agree to talk with a Private Investigator first. I questioned this, and refused to go . I told Occ Med that unless the Private Investigator has a Medical Degree, then that person has no business doing an evaluation on me.

So, now I'm paying out of pocket for medical expenses and have to pay to see a hand surgeon to see just how much nerve damage I have.

mattsmom81 · Aug 13, 2004

I have had many friends injured or infected on the job who have received the runaround; myself included, so I know what you mean perfectly. The 'caring' of these hospitals/nurse employers doesn't extend anywhere near its nurses, but we are expected to give unconditionally to others. I believe nurses SHOULD go public and expose these heartless employers who treat their nurses so poorly after years of giving.

Worst case I know is a coworker who sounds very similar to your situation: she developed MRSA (virulent, systemic and per our own ID docs, NOT community acquired but facility acquired) The hospital of course is NOT helping her...'you can get staph anywhere'...she almost died in ICU, ended up with open wounds and on rehab for months getting some strength back. Now she is disabled...the MRSA went to sepsis, then spinal osteomylitis, ate up her vertebrae requiring multiple surgical stabilizations etc etc. She is a single parent, broke, trying to fight this also.... but after 30 some yrs in nursing and almost dying, some of the fight tends to go out of us I imagine.

I have another coworker who had an injection given incorrectly by the employee health nurse and caused RSD type reaction to a limb...unrelenting pain and disability for the nurse...and the hospital refused to accept responsibility too.

And of course we all see the usual runarounds with pulled muscles, sprained backs and worse...where the facilities intimidate and browbeat the nurse until she gives up the claim and/or goes away quietly. Most of us who have been nurses awhile and mingle with coworkers over the decades have similar stories to tell I'd wager. It is wrong and sad IMO.

Good luck to you and I wish you the very very best in the future. My heart goes out to all people taken advantage of by greedy employers who do everything they can to avoid taking responsibility for occupational hazard and injury. It is rampant in nursing; and hospital's claim to 'care' so much is what angers me when I've seen how badly many nurses are treated.

Sorry so long...but this issue has been the most bitter of all pills to swallow in nursing.

Trvln Nurse, RN · Aug 14, 2004

Thanks for the reply. :crying2: So sorry to hear about your friend who got MRSA. I can totally relate to her energy requirements going all to her healthcare recovery. Because good health is of course the most important thing in our lives and recovery is an all consuming 24 hour a day process. I hope she is able to obtain some simulance of her old life before her injury and is able to survive financially during all this. Still, she may find a point in her recovery were she has healed enough to fight back. Please tell your friend to not miss the time in which she is able to appeal....she can always extent her hearing dates until she is well enough or has the energy enough to have obtained an attorney (which doesn't cost anything in this case....just find a good one). If she missed her time in which she can request an appeal because she was in the hospital she may still be able to request one due to her unusual circumstances of being hospitalized for so many months.

I keep hearing so many stories similiar to this....is there anything we can do? :nono: Companies know their wrong in denying our claims....but do you realize how many millions of dollars they are saving by casting us away even though it's totally unethical? :rotfl: Can we start writing to our local congressment to initiate different laws to protect healthcare workers?....especially in cases of infections. How about writing to the American Nurses Association, etc. Any ideas? :uhoh21:

Thanks again for you input!