I have meeting with charge nurse?!!

[Farza]

hello friends,

i am in my second year of my bsn program; i need your advice please?!

today we had a diabetic patient that i was assigned to take only his vitals and sugar every 4 hrs because they amputate his toes that morning (sad).when i went to his room for the 2nd round to take his vital and his sugar i found him soaking wet on the floor with white mouth (he was almost in coma?!)i felt so bad i ran to his nurse and told her she was very come and told me to take his sugar i told her that i already did it was 37 ?! she told me to grab juice and let him drink it .i told her our university tutor told us in emergency situation we need to make sure we call the nurse and do not act by ourselves, we do not have permission because i am only a student, and in the other hand what if he was choking by drinking juice??

i went back to pt room helped him on the bed and buzz the bell for help .in few second the shift charge nurse came to the room and she was thanking me for everything and she asked me if i notify his nurse ??i told her yes but i didn't tell her the detail that his nurse was on the phone and she was ignoring me??

tomrrow they asked me to go to charge nurse head because she want to talke to me about this situation.

what should i do ?? the dibatic pt nurse told me tell them "i was busy with my other patient ??" with bad

attitude ,but i feel so bad what if she dose the samething to other pt.i don't know what to say and what to do??

thank you.

[CT Pixie, BSN, RN]

If in your position, I would think honesty is the best policy. Just tell the charge nurse what you saw, what you did, what you were told to do.

I'm a bit confused, you state that the pt was on the floor soaking wet and close to a coma, you left the patient and told the nurse and the nurse told you to give him juice to drink, even after knowing his sugar was 37? You helped him to bed and gave him juice? I know when I was in school we were always taugh not to leave the pt alone, to yell, scream, pull the call bell etc to get help in the room with you.

You say he was close to coma yet you were able to assist him to his bed alone and get him to drink juice?? If his sugar was that low was he responsive enough to even drink juice?

Too many things just don't sit right with me with the whole senerio. But like I said, just tell the charge nurse what you saw, what you did, etc..just the facts.

[Farza]

Yes,I helped him in to the bed he is so tiny I did not give him any juice because I thought he might choke.I just ran to his nurse. I don't know why I was not thinking about the bell.

Thank you for your advice.

[MaryAnn_RN]

You need to tell the truth, plus I would inform your school of nursing what has gone on, before the meeting. It might be best to have someone with you.

[avatar78]

They probably have to fill out an incident report on the fall, and so they need to know what happened/how it could be prevented in the future. Not your fault specifically, just part of hospital policy.

[ghillbert, MSN, NP]

If I were you (and I still do this after many years of practice) I would write down what happened when .. now. It becomes harder as time passes to remember what exactly occurred at what time. Write down exactly what you saw, said, did and what others like his nurse did and said.

As mentioned, they probably just want to document accurately what happened for hospital records.

Agree with other posters - in the same situation, DO NOT leave the patient alone! Stay with them and call for help with the bell/buzzer/yell etc. As a nursing student, treating this is not within your scope of practice. If the nurse didn't get off the phone to come and check out a patient on the floor and foaming at the mouth, she needs a good kick up the you-know-what!

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

I was a supervisor and manager for some years. I recognize this as an incident that probably needs to be documented because of the way the patient was found by you. Do not feel that this is like a police interrogation or that you or anyone else on the staff did anything wrong. Think of this as what is called reconnaissance. It is just reviewing the details of what happened in an effort to help everyone involved do a better job the next time. State the facts. No, you do not need to mention that his nurse was on the phone or that she was ignoring you. This is judgmental analysis by you. You have no way of knowing who she was on the phone with. It could have been another doctor she was calling or who had called her and that she was getting orders from. She could have been calling the lab for lab results. She may not have been deliberately ignoring you unless she told you, "leave me alone" or they specifically ask you waht she was doing. She may have been focused on her conversation with the person on the other end of the phone and never heard you or the conversation was too important for her to break it off to address you. If I had a penny for every person who felt I slighted them or thought I was not doing my job because I was tied up on the phone at work I could probably retire a rich woman. People who have not done an RNs job do not understand what it is that we do (manage patient care) and being on the phone is a big part of it. We are not shooting the breeze with friends and family, I promise you and we can only deal with one thing at a time.