Sometimes I stew over and study about things too much, but with my husband in the hospital and with some of the attitudes I've encountered lately I've been thinking about how expensive medical care can be and what people should expect at the hospital.
My husband hasn't been treated poorly, but some of the staff have been less than gracious. I often read about how "nurses are there to save your butt, not kiss it" and "this isn't the Hilton, it's a hospital!" While I understand this to a degree, I think responses like this are rather arrogant and make it sound more like the patients are an inconvenience and are there for the staff than the other way around. Having worked in LTC and home health I know how unreasonably high maintenance some people can be (and yes, these were usually-but not always- the Medicaid patients). Truly, though, this wasn't the norm. Most people were not unreasonable with their requests. Even the ones that put us out a little when they ask you to make a phone call for them or get them extra ice or extra blankets. I'm not talking about rude folks who think you should jump when they snap their fingers, but from the ICU to the med surg floor, I was hesitant to ask for anything at all because more than once I got exasperated looks and sometimes huffy responses to anything I mentioned. I'd say half of the nurses were very accomodating but the other half were like, I've got my job to do and you're keeping me from doing it.
I say, part of the job is customer relations and decent bedside manner, no matter how annoying someone is to us.
What about the people who, like my brother-in-law, shell out tens of thousands of dollars in out of pocket cash to pay for his own quadruple bypass surgery. Why shouldn't he be treated like the customer he is? My husband has insurance, but isn't he in a way, a customer too? I know the hospital and nursing home doesn't include private nurses, but by the same token, if you knew someone was paying A LOT of money to be there wouldn't the customer oriented approach everyone complains about the hospitals adopting these days make sense?
I will admit I was appalled when I learnedsome hospitals were referring to the patients as "customers." But now I'm not so sure this is far off.
While my husband was in surgery I met a man in the waiting room who had a wife in surgery at the same time, and his wife and my husband were transferred to the floor within an hour of each other. I could actually understand the man's frustration at being thrown out of the room for 30 minutes while the nurses were with his wife. He said (obviously po'ed) "I wonder who they think is paying the bill here?"
I am a believer that nurses should run the floor. Thing is, a little power goes to some peoples' heads and they forget what they are really there for.
I've started to look at things more from a patient's perspective lately, and not to sound wishy-washy (but this is a wishy-washy situation) but I've looked at it from both sides now and right or wrong I can't help it this is the way I see it.
VivaLasViejas, ASN, RN
22 Articles; 9,996 Posts
This thread has gotten out of hand, and will now be closed for a cooling-off period.