I haven't had a bath in a week

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my patient yesterday told me this. I gave him a complete bath and realized just how dirty he was...he was telling the truth.

Now I know he could have refused his AM baths but this patient was ambulatory. There were no baths charted for him in the past 8 days. All he needed was some warm water, rags, soap and drying towels. He did 80 percent of it himself, I just helped him with his feet, back, washed his hair & wiped around his picc line with chlorhexidine wipes.

He said his nurse had changed his sheets once that week but that was it.

Anyone else run into this? I mean, I know nurses are busy juggling multiple pts but how hard is it to bathe someone?

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sad...and completely unacceptable :no:

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I can see how that could happen especially if nurses have primary patients. Is it right no, but the patient also could have asked for some water and soap and bathed himself too. Not saying it was the patients fault but I've seen it happen unfortunately.

I had one patient that had an odor and I'm very frank. I said you need to bathe because you have an odor. It was a primary care floor and the nurse had 5-7 patients each and had to do everything for the patients. Needless to say it was a high turnover floor. He said he hadn't bathed in 4 days. So I brought a chair into the bathroom, towels, soap, toothbrush and paste, deodorant and he was able to bath himself. I only had time to do this for 2 of my 7 patients though and I felt bad. I did complain to my direct boss about it and he said they are reevaluating the primary care floors because patient satisfaction scores were down on those floors. Yeah I'm not surprised.

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I guess what i'm asking is whose responsibility is this?

i can understand nurses not getting around to bathe all of their patients, especially when the floor is short staffed

But what are the PCAs/PCTs there for then?

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Specializes in Critical Care, ED, Cath lab, CTPAC,Trauma.

If the patient is ambulatory and alert....why could they not ask for a towel and wash cloth? The patient bears some of the responsibility for this....however....as the nurse, the second day I would encourage the patient myself by placing a chair in the bathroom. leaving a basin of water and telling them I will be back for the rest of the bath like the back and feet.

Maybe the patient wasn't comfortable with a female (if that is what the problem was) I would not be so quick to jump to someone being's lazy but I would watch for patterns of behavior.

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Specializes in ER trauma, ICU - trauma, neuro surgical.

It's ultimately up to nursing and PCT's to make sure the pt is clean. Now, pt's refuse baths all the time. What I hear a lot is "I want a shower. I will do it when I get home or if there's a shower here. Like Esme said, just make them do it. Tell them its an infection control issue (which it is). I hear the news report how dirty hospitals are and how many pt get infections but they never mention the fact that pts refuse to get clean or how family members sneeze over everything and never wash their hands. Or, you can ask the spouse to nag the pt or have the spouse assist the pt is getting clean. The pt may not listen to me, but he will listen to his spouse.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, LTACH, LTC, Home Health.

If the patient is ambulatory, I would question his reason for walking PAST the sink several times a day for a week. In that situation, I think it's safe to assume that he didn't want a bath. If this is an elderly and/or nursing home patient, I would surely not make that assumption. Then again, if you KNOW that you haven't had a bath in a week, then you have the cognition to have done something about it. Sorry about the rant but we encounter far too often in the hospital, those patients who come in with a tummy ache and expect total care. Uh, NO, you walked in here from home; there is nothing wrong with your hands, feet, or APPETITE, walk your *** to the bathroom! And I absolutely DO blame management and their everlasting satisfaction scores. They expect us to kiss *** from the time the patients walk into the parking lot until the time we furnish them a wheelchair ride out the door and gently assist them into the cab that we furnished just to get them outta here!

OP, you struck a nerve with this one. I suffer from PRESENT traumatic stress disorder.:banghead:

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