It's easy: Tamper with things and EXTEND your STAY!

[CaLLaCoDe, BSN, RN]

I so dislike it when patient's purposely mess with dressings...

Such as was the case with a dressing to one of my patient's last night...

A picc line dressing removed without mention to me of the situation. He stated that it just came unwrapped by his moving about. However I did notice his itching his person before later in my shift noticing the missing transparent dressing.

Well, I swiftly took action and redid the dressing explaining to him the risk of infection, the potentiality of his having a longer stay, and a lengthened stay at the hospital can turn out to be leathal. Patient's die from, lose limbs from, are impaired by bad infections. Please let me know next time!

I tire and am fed up of folks who infect their persons in order to keep themselves in the hotel/hospital!:angryfire:angryfire:angryfire Do patients like this have a death wish?! Is life on the outside that bad?

[SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN]

Is life on the outside that bad?

Yes, for some.

[Boston-RN, RN]

I agree, some patients are TERRIFIED to leave the hospital where everything is done for them. I always tell my patients, you need to start doing some things for yourself because the call bell does not go home with you. (obviously things they are supposed to be doing for themselves)

[MNmom3boys]

However I did notice his itching his person before later in my shift noticing the missing transparent dressing.

I will assume that you are aware that some people can have a horrendous reaction to the dressings placed over PICC sites. (I took care of a gal with hyperemesis that had such a severe reaction to the adhesives that we had to come up with some very imaginative innovations to keep the site clean, dry and sterile!)

As for the other - I have to echo Suesquatch - yes, for some it is.

[FireStarterRN, BSN, RN]

It sounds as if he was scratching the dressing because it itched. I sympathise with him. I wouldn't read too much into it.

[oldiebutgoodie, RN]

I agree, some patients are TERRIFIED to leave the hospital where everything is done for them. I always tell my patients, you need to start doing some things for yourself because the call bell does not go home with you. (obviously things they are supposed to be doing for themselves)

Wouldn't it be nice to wake up in the morning and just hit the call bell for your coffee??

(This morning I was making my bed and started to look for the bed control to raise the bed to a comfortable height. If only...)

Oldiebutgoodie

[FireStarterRN, BSN, RN]

You guys sound like you seriously resent many of your patients. I guess I don't mind catering to them since I make pretty good money and, after all, they are sick. Yes, some of them like being helpless, but so what? If I were sick enough to be in the hospital I might appreciate some TLC too.

[psalm, RN]

You guys sound like you seriously resent many of your patients. I guess I don't mind catering to them since I make pretty good money and, after all, they are sick. Yes, some of them like being helpless, but so what? If I were sick enough to be in the hospital I might appreciate some TLC too.

I don't think it is a matter of "catering" to them...but enabling them to stay in the sick role, which contributes to them draining the life out of the staff and taking away from others who are more acutely ill and truly need the help. To do for someone who can do for themselves is not helping them. Assist them, yes, until they need no assistance. As a poster said, that call bell doesn't go home with them.

And some of the worst offenders are the ones who can drag their IV pole down to the parking lot or another floor to visit with a friend or self-medicate.

[TennNurse]

Well, a patient in one of our sister hospitals did some tinkering around and shortened his stay. Policy used to require that we dispose of needles in the sharps container, syringes in the garbage cans. Sharps containers cost a lot more to dispose of than regular garbage, hence the policy. But then Einstein here rummaged through the trash after his nurse flushed his line, crushed up some of his private Percocet stash, mixed it up with water, and injected it into his INT with the discarded flush syringe.

The system-wide report did not mention whether he died instantly or not. The purpose in informing the entire system of this craziness was to introduce a new policy requiring syringe and needle to go into the sharps so future enterprising patients can't get at them.

One man, one idiotic decision, and just like that, overnight, operating costs for the entire network of five hospitals soared.

[NJNursing, ASN, RN]

We have never been able to have syringes, empty or flushes out where patients or their families can touch them. It's considered 'drug paraphenalia'. One of our nurses was actually arrested when she was pulled over and the cops saw a still packaged flush in her bag because she had emptied her pockets in her bag forgetting the flush. The charges were eventually dropped, but she was a scared duckie after that. Now there's a sharps container in our lounge to toss things left in our pockets.

And for the PICC line guy, some people don't do well with the occulsive dressings and his story could have been plausable.

The people who ask for their Dilaudid q 2 hours and have a fit when the doctors change it to q 3 and then a different doctor caters to them and makes it q 2 again.

[Retired R.N.]

I don't think it is a matter of "catering" to them...but enabling them to stay in the sick role, which contributes to them draining the life out of the staff and taking away from others who are more acutely ill and truly need the help. To do for someone who can do for themselves is not helping them. Assist them, yes, until they need no assistance. As a poster said, that call bell doesn't go home with them.

And some of the worst offenders are the ones who can drag their IV pole down to the parking lot or another floor to visit with a friend or self-medicate.

If relieving pain enables a patient to accomplish things (s)he would not otherwise be able to do, what's the problem? It seems to me that you might be letting a short-term situation irritate you entirely too much. A patient who does not get enough sleep on account of pain is going to "drain the life out of the staff" much faster than the one who gets adequate pain relief and plenty of sleep to aid the healing process.

Since neither you nor the call bell goes home with the patient, you won't have to worry about it after the patient is discharged.

Retired R.N.

[psalm, RN]

If relieving pain enables a patient to accomplish things (s)he would not otherwise be able to do, what's the problem? It seems to me that you might be letting a short-term situation irritate you entirely too much. A patient who does not get enough sleep on account of pain is going to "drain the life out of the staff" much faster than the one who gets adequate pain relief and plenty of sleep to aid the healing process.

Since neither you nor the call bell goes home with the patient, you won't have to worry about it after the patient is discharged.

Retired R.N.

But we weren't talking about pain here. We were talking about pts. who won't do for themselves when they are capable...and "using" the nursing staff as personal valets. Pts. who enjoy the "sick role" when it suits them. I work on a busy medical oncology floor and we have pts. with pain issues that do not get ignored or scorned. We also have pts. who are in acute pain at the beginning of their stay (ie, SCC) and still want to be high maintenence when their pain is under control. Our job is to get them to the point where they can do their own ADLs and symptom-free and out the door to a "normal for them" life outside the hospital.