Nurse fired for calling police

[Runman1914]

Last year while eating at local restuarant i witnessed an irate customer being removed by police for screaming at the staff. Last month i witness a patient daughter screaming at staff for more than a week , security called almost every day. She was 10 times worse than the restuarant customer. Each day the nurse manager and administration kissed her butt and apologized. She would make a scene , throw things, etc...

Everyday she was given a new nurse. Nurses were calling off like crazy to avoid this unpleaseasble daughter. Finally after multiple problems with this daughter it came to a head. She came into the nursing station and began to throw things. The charge nurse called the police and she had to be removed kicking and screaming. One week later the nurse was fired for not handling it internally!!!

[CseMgr1, ASN, RN]

People are going to continue get away with this kind of behavior if they know it's going to be allowed. Kudos to this nurse for doing the right thing....and I hope she gets her day in court.

[RN1982]

Yeah, Gringo, you are going to have to keep up up to date on this one.

[mpccrn, BSN, RN]

in this buisness of caring it's unfortunate that we care so little for the staff doing the job everyday. i hope your next job appreciates you :heartbeat

[CseMgr1, ASN, RN]

There was a time when the public respected nurses and treated them well. I was working at a large facility then and we were treated very well by the public. I do not think we have quite as many issues here where I live but it has definately changed. I know this sounds old-fashioned but I do think parents not teaching the kids manners and how to behave have a lot to do with present day behaviors of a lot of patients. I do not know of one show on TV these days that teaches moral behavior, values or ethics. Parents are busy working, so TV and understaffed day care center are doing what parents used to do. I have several grandchildren, they all have manners, drilled into them by parents and by grandparents. I know several situations where my daughters have been called and complemented on the behavior of these children in less than ideal circumstances. One lady at the local bank stated she loves to see any of these kids come in, they are the only customers under age 40 who ever say thank you (according to her). Now that is sad.

Yep. And the doctors and hospitals I worked at backed us up.

I once worked on a busy surgical floor where we had a young man who had been admitted following a MVA. Physically he was recovering well, but was basically very mean and nasty to all of the staff and acting a brat. No amount of "Therapeutic Communication" worked with him. Things finally came to blows during one very difficult shift. I was passing meds when he refused to take them (for the hundreth time). I returned to the Nurses' Station (where his Surgeon happened to be standing) and announced to the Charge Nurse: "XXX is refusing his meds again".

Dr. XXX slammed the chart down he was reading down onto the desk and stormed down the hall to that boy's room. I don't remember everything he said, but it basically went like this: "Listen, Son, I am FEDUP with with the way you are behaving, and you can either straighten UP or get the hell OUT of here". He signed himself out AMA the next morning. Administration was delighted. If that had happened today, they would have launched a MAJOR inquisition. Back then, there were consequences for bad behavior. Nowadays there are consequences for only those who have the courage to "rock the boat" in what has turned out to be an entitled and litigious society.

[Batman24]

What a disgrace. I hope she marches herself to unemployment to get a few bucks to help out while looking for another job and then marches herself to a great lawyer. She could sue for wrongful termination and I agree with whoever said obstruction of justice. Just because she's a nurse doesn't mean she isn't allowed to call police when a situation like this presents itself. Her lawyer could have a field day.

And may I say bravo to the CN who did what was right and tried to protect other patients not to mention her staff from someone abusive. I hope she sues and wins. She should.

[cariboujenny]

Handling it internally?? Sounds like they weren't doing such a good job. Healthcare facilities areso afraid of lawsuits that they often forget their jobs, one of which is creating a safe enviornment for patients and staff. Hope that hospital is in a competetive marketplace. I would find a lawyer, file a wrongful termination (for defending herself?) lawsuit and make sure it makes the papers. Slant it to the "I was trying to protect my patients and staff" viewpoint and see what happens.I would never seek care in a facility that fired someone for trying to protect the floor from a crazy woman.....

I think this is a case of a hostile work environment. With the past documentation of staff abuse and lack of management intervention, I would suspect the hospital may be subject to litigation. I encourage you talk with an attorney regarding this situation.

[psalm51]

the law does not stop at the hospital entrance.

if i, as a citizen, feel threatened by the words or acts of another, i have every right to call the police.

i thiink she has a good case.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

unbelievable!!! you're right, as soon as a guest in a restaurant begins behaving in an unacceptable manner, they call the police. in every single restaurant i have worked in, that is exactly how it was. i would think that at the hospital, they would be even faster to call the police! it's such a shame that it really isn't that way at all. i think this "customer service" bs has gone too far. you are there to care for the patients. you know, the sick and injured, etc., not to please every person who walks in the door. if they don't want escorted out then they should be on their best behavior. that behavior would have been unacceptable in any place that person was. i don't know why it should be tolerated in a hospital!!

[color=#483d8b]i wonder, 20 years ago, how did people behave in hospitals? was there ever a time when people were respectful of the staff and patients? if so, how long ago was that, anyway?

things started to change in the mid 80s -- or maybe that's when i started to notice it. family members became less and less grateful and respectful and managers started to tolerate more and more bs from them. when i started out in nursing in the late 70s, patients and family respected the nursing staff.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

i saw a pulmonologist smack a nurse in the face with a metal-backed chart one time. the apology went something like "i wasn't trying to hit you, i was trying to hit him." (pointing at the cardiac surgeon, with whom he didn't get along.) manager called the police. i didn't see the manager again for a couple of years, when she came back as an agency nurse.

[color=#483d8b]pulmonologist finally got arrested when he decked a nephrologist. this was in the mid 1980s.

[mizfradd, CNA]

the law does not stop at the hospital entrance.

if i, as a citizen, feel threatened by the words or acts of another, i have every right to call the police.

i thiink she has a good case.

^ I agree and think she has a good case too.

At my place of employment we are encouraged to call the DON first if at all possible or page the code for violence, but we are also told we can dial 911 and when police arrive, file an assault charge personally for either verbal or physical or even for cursive & abusive language as the case/s may be.

Our DON is old school, backs us up in so many ways and we love her; she tells us, "None of the staff working here have to put up with being cursed at or threatened."

[glasgow3]

I just finished reading a thread where an RN was assigned 28 acute care patients with a team of 1 LPN and two aides----and now this one, where a nurse was fired for reporting an obviously out-of-control family member to police. How many such examples are needed to convince fair and reasonable people that many hospitals have lost their ability to deal fairly and ethically with their employees? What is it going to take to convince nurses that they must organize and become politically active?

I hope that both of these nurses obtain redress within the legal system, but as individuals their chances are not good. Even under the best of circumstances, time and money is on the side of the employers and they know how to exploit that advantage very well.

The first nurse may well have to fight for even their unemployment benefits since they did quit. The second will have to defeat the employment-at-will doctrine, perhaps through some public policy exception. It often comes as a shock that in general employers have absolutely no legal obligation to be fair with respect to employment decisions in the absence of a contract.

I urge nurses to remember threads such as these when you hear folks state, "Unions had their place at one time but now they are no longer necessary".

[TLCinCICU]

There's a little reheorificed tirade I've had in my mind for years that I've never had the guts to actually say: "You are NOT on public property. You do NOT have the right to act however you want. You are here as a COURTESY to your loved one that is in our bed and you CAN be escorted out our doors if you don't behave in a civilized manner." Perhaps I'll work up the nerve to say it one day...

Sometimes I wonder if we haven't been too effective in pushing the patient's "bill of rights" over the years. They hit our doors feeling they have a right to everything under the sun...and rarely express appreciation for it.