I'm sorry, but I didn't realize I signed up to please the customer. While the nurses go around reminding the patients this is a hospital, not a hotel, we get notices that we SHOULD make these people feel like they're in a hotel. Or "even if you know they're wrong, you should apologize and let them know that they're right" THIS IS AN ACTUAL MEMO THAT APPEARED IN MY MAILBOX.
... oh but it gets worse.
I got tapped on the shoulder by the "hospital customer service rep" telling me this patient (customer) really really wants a milkshake and would really make her day if she could have a milkshake. And I tell this rep this patient just had a bowel resection yesterday and not only can she NOT have a milkshake, but she probably can't even have water, even ice, for the next couple days. I spend all day listening to this patient whine and complain, and now the hospital has provided her a rep to follow me out in the hallway to whine and complain. And neither of them can admit that although a milkshake would make the patient really happy for about 15 mins, going back to surgery and prolonging the recovery would not. I know there's a lot of things in the medical field that seem downright cruel. But if we go by "the customer is always right" keep the patient/customer happy, there will be consequences.
Should customer service be #1 priority? Or am I just being delusional believing that patient safety is more important than patient satisfaction?
I dont know if I really want to go back to the days of "visiting hours" days.., like in the 60's ( and before) when you could just about "check in" like a hotel, more or less cause you were "Nervous" or something like that, needed a little "rest and relax". time, Insurance didn't run the show, I bet those nurses really "hopped to" for customer service, in their white dresses, and hats, My Mother worked during those times, she always had such stories to tell of those days, I miss her, , and her stories of being an RN in the 40's and 50's and 60's ect.. I have had days too, when I think , What the heck am I? , A short order cook?
One thing I must note is nurses will respond based on where they work and how much support they have in their workplace from ancillary staff and administration.
I would not appreciate if someone was yelling diarrhea into the intercom or out of their room(as one respondant suggested). If I was in no position to help them, they would wait....that would not make a difference! It also suggests that a nurse would not respond due to "not feeling like it'? I can't imagine!
I help in whatever way I can with the basics, HOWEVER I work in the ER and as an example I will give one of my days last week...
1-CCU patient
1-ICU patient
1-old cva with new symptoms
1-new cva, PE, occluded carotid
*I had these four all day.
subsequent other patients switching in and out during the day in my two remaining spots-each a new workup and unknown!
child coding-dying....followed by adult coding dying....
In reality-unit nurses have 2, maybe 3 patients. I had two unit patients, two telemetry, 1 bed that rotated, and assisted in two major BAD CODES! According to administration they are with a critical care nurse so they are safe...hmmm.
If you are the parent of the child, do you care if my patient has to pee, poop, or is hungry?
If you are part of the family of the patient who requires neuro checks q 1hr, do you care about someone coding?
I had hourly, 2 hr, 3 hr and 4hr neurochecks on my patients. I had multiple dangerous drips running on all of my patients, I had hourly accuchecks and follow up labs to be performed on all my patients. I had communication, and oversight of all of my patients movements and the need to escort off of the floor with only cursory glances by those supposed to be "watching" my patients while I was gone. Additionally, pages and pages of orders that needed to be taken off and done!
The toilet is the last thing that mattered to me during that shift! I think it needs to be said there are always people who perform their jobs adequately and as safely as possible; HOWEVER one can only juggle so many balls before dropping them. I am not Hercules, just a mere human that chose to be a nurse.
As for those of you with definite ideas of what a nurse should do, I say this....during the past five years I have seen a definitive change in both the business end of what we do and the health of the patients using our services. Patients are much sicker and require many interventions, doctors and systems are ordering tons of tests to cya against lawsuits, and personnel has been cut to the bone. Customer service initiatives involving boosting staff should be the priority, not beating up the nurses.
Wiithout us, there is no treatment, hospital, or care....
Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
I think it's possible to practice nursing AND provide good customer service. It's often about attitude and when you have refuse, HOW you deliver the refusal. I have been fortunate in that I have had no complaints, even when I had to refuse requests that were out of bounds of safety in doing my job.
I'm sorry your mother has had poor care. But instead of interrupting our vent thread you need to write a letter to the hospital or care facility to outline your concerns about your mothers care. Don't whine about it, do something about it.
I think that one of the HUGE differences between nursing care and customer service is that in customer service is a customer is abusive you can draw the line and refuse their business. Can't really see that going down well with a sick patient.
This article is interesting and pretty much sums up how I feel about the whole thing.
the big problem as i see it,,,,is that "customer service" is designed to make customers want to return for more. Were as good health care is designed to prevent the need to return.......this dichotomy is hard to resolve.
Thank you for all of your suggestions. Problem is we HAVE TRIED all of them. Where it got out of hand is with a former manager who had family in ICU in another hospital that did have visiting hours, and she bullied her way in and bullied the staff the whole time she was there...despite security intervening. She was very proud of that fact when she had a unit meeting the following week that this occured and proceeded to tell us "from this moment on we will have an open unit, no restrictions on the visitors at all." That is when we as staff lost control of our environment and haven't been able to get it back. With our current manager our unit is closed for 1 hr during shift report because "that is the compromise that the doctors would give me." Excuse me!??!?!?!?!? Since when do the docs dictate visiting hrs.They are in and out with the patients 5-15 min,depending on how sick they are. Then they have the nerve to tell us that the family needs to leave so that they can do their exam/procedures. You are the one that said they could be there, you make them leave and deal with their attitude when they don't want to. Many of our docs have said that we need to have restricted hours again. We aren't talking severe restrictions like many of the other hospitals in our area ( 15 min every 4 hrs), a compromise between 24/7 and 15 min q 4hrs. It is very hard to enforce the rules when management doesn't. We do go over the brochure but it makes no difference. We have been asking for signs to go up outside the doors to get visitors attention but have gotten nowhere with that either.
Management/administration's motto is: the customer is always right even when they are wrong. And they will listen to the families complaint, issue, bmc session and agree with them. Then when we get told about the complaint we have to bend over backwards and make nice no matter what.
There's customer service then there is screw your staff customer service.
Specializes in LTC,Hospice/palliative care,acute care.
I am not a nurse, but I just spent the last 10 years caring for my elderly parents, which necessitated a lot of time with them in hospitals.
It really bothered me to read the posts about limiting visiting time. We tried to keep at least one member of our family with my parents at all times, because the quality of care they got from the nursing staff was often horrible!
Some examples: My mother had bypass surgery, and the next day she still could not even sit up in bed without assistance. Her lunch was brought up to her room by the dietitician, and was left by her bedside...out of reach. It sat there for two hours without a nurse even chacking on my mother to see if she needed assistance. Mopm hdn't eaten in almost two days and was very hungry, but had to lie there with the food out of reach. She rang for the nurse, but they were doing a shift change, and said that they couldn't help her for an hour, at minimum.
Another example. My mom (heart patient) was not allowed to get up without assistance, so she rang for the nurse to help her go to the restroom. It was 45 minutes before the nirse came, at which time my mother was sitting, wet, cold and miserable, in a pool of urine. How humiliating for her!
Another example. My mom is on blood thinnners. A lab tech came and drew blood, but did not apply pressure to the draw site. She left the room, and my mom had blood dripping from her arm. She rang for the nurse, and it was 30 minutes later before one came. There was a large puddle of blood on the bed, floor, and my mom's gown by that time. She's anemic, and this blood loss certainly didn't help her condition.
For patients on a heart ward, how can a nurse go hours without checking on their patients??? If family members weren't there to help my mom to the restroom, help her with her food, make sure her insulin arrived when the meal did, etc, my mom would had a horrible quality of life when in the hospital.
The nurses say that they are understaffed...but when you go to the nurses' station and see them standing around discussing a party they attended, it's obvious that their dedication is severely at question.
so I have also cared for a parent and I am a nurse. When a patient is lying in bed waiting for assistance 10 mins can seem like an hour or more. I KNOW my mother had to wait for things like a meal tray that was placed across the room or a box of tissues when I was not there-she told me so.I know this was because the nurses were dealing with much more critical issues at that time. However when I was there and she rang the bell for something I saw the difficulty she had waiting and how she over-estimated the time frame. How do you KNOW the tray sat for 2 hrs unless you were there? How do you KNOW she sat in urine for 45 mins unless you were there ? How do you KNOW she bled for 30 mins unless you were there ? As for patients on a "heart ward" in my experience they are usually on a portable telemetry monitor.That means that someone at the desk is watching exactly what their heart is doing at all times . As for nurses standing around the nurses station "chatting" We can multi task-since you are NOT a nurse you have NO idea what else they were doing while they were "chatting"
I respectfully disagree. There have been some strongly worded posts in this thread and many similar ones ... but those strong words convey the sometimes overwhelming frustration of nurses trying desperately to provide the best, most appropriate care for the patient while being hindered in doing so from multiple sources -- redundant documentation requirements, conflicts with ancilliary services, ioditic customer satisfaction surveys, and yes, families.
Does a good emotional support system help the patient? Absolutely. However, given today's "customer service" mentality and melodramatic media reports, too many families interpret their "support" role as an adversarial one. Some family members are amenable to education on their loved one's plan of care, but many are not. This thread is filled with examples.
And those "tasks" you speak so disparagingly of ... are the prescribed plan of care and the reason for the patient's hospitalization. I'm not saying that kindness isn't a part of that - of course it is. But if a warm smile and a pat on the head were all that the patient required to get well ... they wouldn't be in the hospital.
Yes, patients and family are the reasons why we have jobs. BUT the "tasks" helps up keep our jobs--license. In this SUE-HAPPY world, documentation and all of the "tasks" we need to do are very important.
My tasks come second to patient safety. Patient satisfaction will just have to be less of a priority.
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We do go over the brochure but it makes no difference. We have been asking for signs to go up outside the doors to get visitors attention but have gotten nowhere with that either.
scoutsmom
47 Posts
I dont know if I really want to go back to the days of "visiting hours" days.., like in the 60's ( and before) when you could just about "check in" like a hotel, more or less cause you were "Nervous" or something like that, needed a little "rest and relax". time, Insurance didn't run the show, I bet those nurses really "hopped to" for customer service, in their white dresses, and hats, My Mother worked during those times, she always had such stories to tell of those days, I miss her,
, and her stories of being an RN in the 40's and 50's and 60's ect.. I have had days too, when I think , What the heck am I? , A short order cook?