allegator

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1. The Slow Code: Justified?

   allegator replied to TheCommuter's topic in Safety

   Exactly what happened to my dad. The very first physician order written in the ER said "DNR." Nobody owns up to knowing how it got there and an order written later that evening by the admitting/attending said "Full-code," but if you ask me the damage...

2. The Slow Code: Justified?

   allegator replied to TheCommuter's topic in Safety

   Yes, it's your individual decision if you play by house rules. I think most hospitals would require you to sign a form asserting your refusal to provide "medically ineffective" treatment. The hospital would then be on the hook to secure their patie...

3. The Slow Code: Justified?

   allegator replied to TheCommuter's topic in Safety

   Calivianya, if only more in the health care field felt as you do! You can't go down the slow code road because it's a slipperly slope. Refusing to break a 95-year-old cancer patient's ribs invariably leads to what happened to my father; elderly but ...

4. The Slow Code: Justified?

   allegator replied to TheCommuter's topic in Safety

   Never mind slow code, what about no code? That's what the doctors and nurses did to my father a decade ago, and, despite my best efforts to hold the bad actors accountable, they got away with it.

5. The Elderly Are Devalued

   allegator replied to TheCommuter's topic in Geriatric

   This topic brings to mind a thread that I started almost 10 years ago regarding the "undertreatment" (abandonment) of my father: https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-discussion/withholding-treatment-elderly-49431.html How vividly I can still recall ...

6. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

   allegator replied to allegator's topic in General Nursing

   Kids-r-fun, couple minor clarifications. He had no stroke, only CAP. He was getting less than half the recommended dose of quinalone although his renal function was normal. The records indicate they told me reintubation was necessary and I refused...

7. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

   allegator replied to allegator's topic in General Nursing

   Mjlrn97, I too am very sorry to hear of your loss. I think it would be inappropriate for your anger to ever totally "resolve." Were the clueless doctors who "treated" your mother by looking in her chart for 10 seconds and overlaying yet another med...

8. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

   allegator replied to allegator's topic in General Nursing

   Fergus51 you have certainly not offended me. Sadness and grief is what I felt the first six months. Anger is what I feel now. I've gone through the records very carefully and I think my anger is appropriate. As I've said, the problem is that I fee...

9. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

   allegator replied to allegator's topic in General Nursing

   Hi Ktwlpn, CAP is community aquired pneumonia. My concern with my dad who "passed away" in March is that they didn't just do a slow code; they did a no code - despite my being in the room when the respiratory distress began and pleading for intubati...

10. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

    allegator replied to allegator's topic in General Nursing

    Thanks for the candid replies. I see where you're all coming from and appreciate it. None of us want to see our loved ones in that kind of situation yet it happens all-too-frequently. But what of the 90-something ambulatory dementia patient who suf...

11. Withholding Treatment Of Elderly Patients

    allegator posted a topic in General Nursing

    Is it common for doctors treating an elderly patient (90+) to have a tacit understanding amongst themselves that they won't do anything major (ie intubation or reintubation) even if the family requests that "everything be done" and the patient is ful...