Older, overweight, and drug addicted patients

[NurseBatzy]

I would be willing to bet by the title that the reader here will think this is a rant, but it is quite the opposite. This came about because the longer I spend here on AN, and the longer I work in a hospital, the more my heart breaks to see how some of our patients are treated.

I am grateful for older patients:

Some may say it is time to let them go, to stop trying, and give up. If the patient and family do not want to stop, I want to be the nurse that agrees to keep fighting with them.

I am grateful for overweight patients:

When they are brought to tears by embarrassment, when they spend day after day listening to snide remarks by the staff and turn angry when they have had enough of health care providers complaining about them, I want to be the nurse to give them some dignity.

I am grateful for drug-addicted patients:

Some don't want to quit, and won't. Some want to quit, and can't. When others see a "junky" or a person who could never amount to anything, I want to be the nurse to see potential in the human being trapped inside an addict's body.

I didn't become a nurse to take care of only the patients I deemed worthy of my care. I became a nurse to help people. All people. I'm not here to judge them, and I am lucky to have a job. If it weren't for these patients, imagine how much worse the nursing job market would be. I am lucky to be able to help people who need it most, and make a living doing it.

On a side-note, I am also grateful for all of the wonderful, fantastic, and talented nurses!

[Creamsoda, ASN, RN]

Ill be the first to say, how ever rude it may sound, they are all why I have a job. I wont judge them, i just go in and do the job and go home. But if it werent for a majority of these people in the hospital, I wouldnt be working.

[beckster_01, BSN, RN]

I wish I could say that I could be the nurse you described for every one of my patients. I will be the first to admit that it depends largely on the patient's attitude, and perhaps more on my own mood/stress level.

I practice nursing with a no-judgement policy. Every time I enter a room is a new experience. I don't care what I hear in report, and I don't care what the patient said to me during our last encounter. Just yesterday I watched a patient go from hostile to bubbly in a matter of seconds just because I brought her a pair of the sorry-excuse-for-underwear that we keep on the floor along with the pair of scrub pants she demanded moments before (granted, she did have some psych issues).

However there are the days when my back is aching from caring for the 400 lb patient who: can't(won't) move his big toe, SCREAMED for 4 more packs of graham crackers with whole milk, and gave me crap for wanting to check his blood sugar before I obliged. You are much less likely to find me as the cheerful, up-beat, no nonsense nurse on those days.

But I understand where you are coming from. I do try and give the benefit of the doubt whenever possible, and I detest the co-workers who never once try to see things from a patient's perspective. But man...some days...

[brandy1017, ASN, RN]

NurseBatzy,

You have a good heart, I hope you do not become injured while caring for the morbidly obese or dealing with etoh/drug detox etc. I think most nurses have a good heart but have become burnt out, injured, or dealing with PTSD from these highly challenging patients! I would never be purposely mean or rude to anyone, but I do dread taking care of certain patients because I've been injured before dealing with 400 pound person and too many insane, psyche and dare I say possibly evil or possessed mentally ill/drug patients than I care to count. These violent mentally ill come in with medical problems, abuse and threaten and at times injure with malice staff so I have no desire to deal with such people.

If you are willing and able to care for them I'd be eternally grateful that I could be spared the trauma of dealing with some of these nasty, evil mentally ill patients! Not all mentally ill or etoh/drug patients are this way, but I've dealt with too many that threaten and abuse the staff!

[dutches2007]

brandy1017 ,

some facilities permit you to press charges if

"these violent mentally ill come in with medical problems, abuse and threaten and at times injure with malice staff".

that way you can have some extent of peace and serenity to do your job. if they come in that way and end up with legal charges against them for their conduct, they know better next time inspite of their mi or substance dependance.

[dutches2007]

nursebatzy,

thanks for sharing.

[backtowork]

Nursebatzy..I love your gentle spirit and compassion. We need more nurses like you. Thank you for caring for all who, many times, cannot care for themselves. :heartbeat:nurse::heartbeat

[sapphire18]

Love this! I get so frustrated and saddened listening to the opposite attitude day in and day out...thank you! I want a nurse like you caring for me when I'm hospitalized the next time for depression (which hopefully won't be for a long time but I know it's inevitable eventually) because believe me, the other kind of nurse makes being sick and in the hospital a million times worse.

[badmamajama]

Can I move to where you are and work with you? I would love love love to be around such a positive, uplifting spirit! What you just described is exactly the kind of nurse I always strive to be. It is such a challenge, though, for many of the same reasons everyone else talked about.

We should clone you.

T

[Purple_Scrubs, BSN, RN]

I think that most nurses want to have the same non-judgmental attitude as yours, OP. Sometimes we get a little crispy around the edges and need a reminder. Thank you for providing that. :)

[FLmomof5]

I always treat my patients with dignity and compassion, but it doesn't mean that some of the decisions that are made tweet my 'irritated' button. That is a personal thought and issue.

That being said, I cannot see the justification of a severely demented 98 yo who is contracted being kept in full code status. Why? For whose benefit? Then there is the unresponsive 60+ DM II patient with bilat AKA and a G-tube also a full code.What quality of life do they have? I see the love of a daughter who comes by every day to braid mama's hair....but, at some point we have to realize that we are all terminal (insomuchas we will ALL die someday) and the more human thing to do is to let go and Let God.

I am still a noob in nursing and I can see why nurses can think and feel what they do. The very sick diabetic who may have changed the course of their illness did not comply with the regimen and now suffers for it.....it breaks my heart, but worse is going to Waffle House and seeing the Morbidly obese chowing down on fried breakfasts knowing that one day, they will most likely be a patient in my unit suffering the same fate.....if only they could be that person for a day....would the change what they could now?

I have compassion because I cannot speak frrom the moral high ground. I smoke. Quitting is a very difficult prospect. I should change that now, but I haven't. So I cannot sit and judge others for their own weaknesses.

I pray that someday I may die in my own bed never having been a burden to my family. God bless all those who care, give respect and dignity to all regardless of what we may have done to ourselves!

[psych41]

My feelings exactly but, be very careful if this is truly what you are because you are at risk. You are at risk for burn-out. The patients will love you, but your co-workers and management may look at your practise from a different perception than you have. When you nurse with your heart, when you do get hurt, and when your wings are clipped it takes a very very long time to heal. Wear some type of armour over the heart on your sleeve, just a word or two of advice from someone who believes like you and has for the over 20 years she has nursed.