I do building maintenance at a hospital. When you submit a request for a repair, please be specific. "Toilet don't work" just isn't enough. Is it clogged? Does the water not flow when flushed? What is it? Also, I wish the floor staff would stop keeping the Soft-N-Fresh paper towels in the patient rooms. Some CNA's and patient's family seem to think these are great toilet paper until they clog up their toilet. And what is it about women who just gave birth that makes them think pads go in the toilet? I've had to deal with a nurse cursing me out for a tv not working in an empty room when the only thing wrong was she was too stupid to realize it wasn't plugged in the electrical socket. We had a roof leaking water near the station's kitchen and the floor supervisor tried to order me to go on the roof in the middle of a thunder storm to put out tarp to stop the leak. I tried to be as polite as possible when I told her no and if she didn't like it to write me up. I've pulled knives, straws, food, and paper out of the drain pipe of a sink in NICU and the nurses there said, "well why don't you install a garbage disposal?". I went off on her and told her why should the hospital pay for you to have a disposal when you're putting things in the sink that would break a disposal. Also, if something is broken and is important, send a request to maintenance. Don't wait until you happen to see us in a hall and say, "oh, by the way, since you're here,..." If we're on the floor then we're already busy with something and we don't have perfect memory to remember all of our duties as well as the one you "happen" to remember when you saw us. If a patient is complaining they are too hot or too cold, send a maintenance request before requesting a fan and don't assume that since you're comfortable that the patient is imagining they're hot or cold. I enjoy making the patient's comfortable. I hate seeing a patient sweating for days before someone bothers to let us know of the problem. And quit opening windows. We have some nurses who constantly open windows because they're either too hot or too cold while everyone else is comfortable. Stick your head in the freezer if you're having hot flashes and leave the windows alone. And to the ER staff members, if you have the key to access the elevators' independent service, remember to turn it back to normal when you're finished. Also for the ER, get your own tools. I don't mind bringing tools to the ER for medical staff to use on a patient but they always seem to expect me to use the tools on the patient which ain't gonna happen. One genius wanted me to bring my greasy boiler room tools to surgery. No, I didn't bring them the tools to use on a patient. Surgery has sterile tools for that, they just had to get off their lazy backsides to go find them for themselves. There are a few good nurses here where I work, but they are so few that all the lazy ignorant ones stand out. How about the floor that decided to take the education TV VCR cart to their desk, turn off all the lights, pop some popcorn, and watch a movie for their shift? Yep, they did that and yep, I reported them, and yep, they got a light slap on the wrist. That's what happens when your administration is made up of majority of former nurses. They can do no wrong while every other staff can't do anything right.
ER story. Late one evening a man walked into the ER with a yellow boa constrictor wrapped around him and he held it's head tightly in his hand. It was his roommate's snake and it bit him while he slept. He grabbed it, got in his car, and drove to the ER with the snake. Some staff refused to treat him as long as he held the snake. It was put in a trashcan with something heavy on the lid. The snake was not killed and he brought it back home with him.
I guess a lot of strange stuff happens in the ER. I've heard somewhere on this website that a homeless guy came to the ER and they found a rattlesnake on him. He was using it to protect his suitcase.
We had a floor closed for various reasons and it was discovered that a homeless man was living in one of those rooms. He was sleeping and showering there at night and hitting the town in the daytime.
I once had to help ER remove a wrought iron candle holder from a girl's finger. Took four of us to bend it back away from her finger. Because fishing is big around here a common ER problem is fish hooks. One recent case had to be cut open to have the hook removed from his calf.
From a plumber's point of view our problem is almost always women. Tampons and maxipads do not go in the toilet. One female nurse in surgery is always clogging the toilet in the surgery nurse's lounge with such items even though there's a trash can on the wall in the stall for that purpose. Another plumber problem is kids trying to clog the toilet. Oh, a common problem involves CNAs. You have a bedridden patient. You get the patient on the pot, you wipe and wipe and wipe and wipe until the pot is full of toilet paper, and then the person tries to dump the entire load all at once in the toilet and sit there and wonder why it's not going down. I'm sure many of you know that sometimes the load the patient releases is enormous. It's like the dam broke open. It's best to try to drop some in the toilet and flush rather than the entire load. You know the disposable towels used to bath a patient? Some CNAs and patient family use that as toilet paper.
One thing that could plug a toilet is a really huge BM. I've seen one and had to break it up with tongue depressors and flush a little at a time. It was the size of a big grapefruit.
Something to consider is your refrigerator. Don't push it all the way up against the wall. That will block off much of the air flow for the condensor coils causing the compressor to work harder to maintain correct temperature. Also, don't store things on top of the refrigerator towards the back that would also block air circulation. This goes for your home refrigerator as well. If your floor has an ice machine then don't block the vents on the sides. One floor did this by storing cup boxes on the side of the machine. This caused the machine to overheat and stop working.
And don't be afraid of the elevators. I use to do elevator/escalator repair. I'm terrified of escalators knowing what I know now. A hydraulic elevator (usually 2 or 3 floors) will not fall like in the movies. If there's a hydraulic leak it will simply lower until it reaches a little below the first floor where someone can get you out safely. If it's a tension or cable elevator there are several cables holding the elevator. Each cable is tested to beyond the car's maximum weight capacity. Even if all cables are cut there are emergency breaks that will stop the car so fast and hard that mechanics will need a cutting torch to remove the breaks. And if the motor totally fails the elevator will not go down. The counter weight weighs more than a fully loaded elevator so the elevator will instead go up as the counter weight goes down and since the difference in weight isn't that great it won't be a very fast ride up. Our hospital test all emergency call systems in all elevators every month to ensure they work. If you hear someone trapped in an elevator and you call maintenance, please be specific as to which elevator and what floor it's stuck on. Our hospital has 17 elevators so we need to know exactly which one for fast response. If you're claustraphobic then keep in mind that there's an intentional air gap in the elevator doors and an exhaust fan to constantly draw fresh air into the elevator shaft. Escalators are nothing more than motorized meat grinders. I'll ride them but I'll have both hands on the handrails at all times.
One thing that could plug a toilet is a really huge BM. I've seen one and had to break it up with tongue depressors and flush a little at a time. It was the size of a big grapefruit.
I'm guessing this example won't be used as a tool for recruiting new nurses :chuckle.
Next time I'm having to change out an isolette because one of my babies had a blow-out or an ostomy bag fell off, I'll think of this and know that things could always be worse :).
I've seen and smelled worse. I was called to the ICU to open the window in a patient's room. We're not suppose to open windows but I did this time. The patient had a rotting flesh problem and a nurse had to stay in the room with the patient at all times. The stench was so bad all of the ICU staff were getting nautious (sp?).
They don't intentionally flush urine sample cups. Sometimes I see the cup on the shelf which is locate below the mirror but right next to the toilet. Sometimes the cup is on the back of the toilet where it could easily get accidentally knocked in the toilet.
As for saving electricity, I'm not a tree hugging enviromentalist. I saw our electric bill and choked. Every extra dollar we spend on utilities is one dollar less we spend on unimportant things like staff salaries.
squeakykitty
934 Posts
I guess a lot of strange stuff happens in the ER. I've heard somewhere on this website that a homeless guy came to the ER and they found a rattlesnake on him. He was using it to protect his suitcase.