ok, so heres a question, do we all come across as nurses with attitudes when we speak to relatives on the phone. ok, so we know that we cant give information over the phone just to anybody, but there must be a better system for relatives who are not close to the hospital and cannot visit. there are no phones in the rooms so, you cant speak directly to them and there is no cell phone usage,,,'it interferes with the equipment" even although thats been disproved. patients have phones in each room over here and are allowed full use of their cell phones. then when you get the ward sister on the phone in the uk, she is totally off hand and makes no effort to communicate between the patient and myself, and repeats the "no cell phone usage" unless the patient can walk off the ward to use it. over here we have a password system, so that the patient chooses who can have information. in scotland, we used to have that patientline, that charged an arm and a leg for patients to use it, its about time the uk health system came up something that works for both patient and relatives. after all theres nothing worse than having a dozen relatives all calling to the nurses for the same patient.
its funny how we are told by the hospitals in the uk that the patient cannot use their cellphone as it interferes with the equipment, but the same cell phones dont affect the equipment in the us.
its not right that a patient loses contact with their family because of the rules that are made by the hospitals, what if someone dies and because their children live away they are not allowed to talk to the patient. like you bright eyes, we dread the day our parents are admitted to hospital, when do we decide to fly home when you cant get any information from the hospital. we are in a country where time off is very limited and we cant just fly home at any time, and thats not taking into account the cost.
i know cariad, it's really scary! it's something myself and hubby (brit too) talk about often but we choose to bury our head in the sand and not really address it. i can't imagine how stressful it'll be if/when something happens!
Specializes in midwifery, ophthalmics, general practice.
when my uncle was in hospital with an inoperable frontal lobe tumour, my mum (another nurse) phoned the ward to ask how he was. now she lives in Essex, he was in hospital in Edinburgh.. she went up to see him every weekend for 3 mths.. until he died. when she asked the nruse how he was, she was told he was comfortable and had been pottering round the ward... at a time when he could no longer walk! nor could he feed himself. The nurses were not kind to my poor mum.. and she actually ended up reporting one of them to the NMC (never upset my mum- she is old school and ended up very senior - 8b equivelent before retiring) for unprofessional conduct.
my uncle ended up in a hospice and the care there was fantastic, cant tell you how great they were, but the hospital was awful. my uncle managed to fall down some stairs and break his jaw because the tumour affected his memory first and he wanted to go home. no one noticed he was gone until he was found at the bottom of the stairs. sad.
Specializes in Med/Surg/Ortho/HH/Radiology-Now Retired.
I've said it before, I'll reiterate it now ..... nurses should NEVER lose sight of the fact that they (we) are "in service!".
Nurses who elevate themselves to lofty heights and forget the humanitarian aspect of the nursing profession, need reminding of just what being a nurse is really all about.
although some nurses become very laid back about the job, and we do have a very weird sense of humour about things that happen, but i do believe that is our way of de-stressing amongst ourselves, but when we deal with relatives, we need to become sensitive to their needs, and as i stated before, hospitals need to lose the cell phone issue, as it helps the patient to keep contact with the outside world, and their family, at a time when it is needed.
BrightEyes
42 Posts
i know cariad, it's really scary! it's something myself and hubby (brit too) talk about often but we choose to bury our head in the sand and not really address it. i can't imagine how stressful it'll be if/when something happens!