OMG The Doctors at my facility are out of control.

Nurses General Nursing

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Specializes in M/S, Travel Nursing, Pulmonary.

OMG. I'm beside myself. I don't even know where to begin.

So, moral has been low at my facility........critically low. People fearing layoffs, hospitals near us closing down, census drastically low, a company being brought in to analyze the place for places to "make cuts", supplies not stocked anymore. Its gotten to the point where you just go to work, duck your head.......watch your patients and get out. Its all you can do.

I was THIS CLOSE to accomplishing that today. Actually, had a great shift........got all my work done, got to spend QT with the patients rather than just run in and hand them pills then leave. Made it all the way up to quit time........and a new nurse from down the hall tell me her pt. is desaturating. So, seeing day shift is taking their time getting on the floor........I go to help (this is like 5 min. before I want to leave).

I tell the nurse to call the attending while RT is in the room putting O2 on the pt. She tells me she doesn't know who to call.............a surgeon is the attending but someone else has been handling medical management. I tell her to call both and let them decide who is going to handle it.

A surgeon (not even on the case) sitting there starts giving me heck about my call to call both. Goes on and on about inappropriate calls he recieves and this and that. I humor him, tell the new nurse to call whoever is listed as attending and even ask "Who would you suggest be called." He has no answer (:smokin:of course) but proceeds to rant on and on about how bad calling everyone is. So, I go on helping the new nurse, waiting to get orders to put into action for the pt. (which is now delayed because the surgeon is slowing us down badly) and he decides he is going to "see the pt". :eek:

He goes in the pt. room, talks to her for like........half a minute.........and comes out of the room and proceeds to go on and on about inappropriate calls. I finally tell him I've heard his point, I got it, I need to move on to the pt's care now. I'm done with the conversation. He doesn't like this of course. Starts asking me to get the Charge Nurse/supervisor for him........wants to argue with me. I keep telling him "I'm done with this conversation, please......move on". He doesnt want to hear it. I wanted to knock the guy out at this point.

So, he storms off the unit, makes it clear I am being reported. Nice. And a friend/colleague sitting near at the time tells me I'm disrespectful. Doh:eek:.

OMG, never thought I'd be in a position where I'd have to swing through physicians to get focused on a pt. who is near needing Rapid Response. Now..........I have seen EVERYTHING.

Best part is, this facility is looking for reasons to get rid of people. So yes, on my way home I realize I just gave them reason to. Not very smart on my part.

Specializes in M/S, Travel Nursing, Pulmonary.

Guess my theory that doctors are less likely to try to use me as a punching bag (being a guy) is out the window. Most of the time, they find some nurse who will take it and yell at them.

Specializes in psychiatric nursing, med/surg adult care.

Cross the bridge when you get there.

I think you have a good argument to defend yourself.

Prepare though to apologize PRN, should you be called in for some explanations. As long as you are in good faith that you did your part and caused nothing to harm your patient, everything else that comes your way that would reduce you to be the person that you are not, comes secondary.

Don't show the feeling. Smile.

I'm on your side.

Specializes in ICU, Telemetry.

Ever had a doc in the ER refuse to come eval a pt who'd ripped out a trach at 0300 and was throwing copious amounts of flash edema? And had this doc tell you, "I'll come if you say he's a code." And his rationale? If the ER doc responds to a floor code, he gets paid extra, he doesn't get "paid" to come to the floor -- beyond the 10x my salary he's already making...

It's not that I'm not smart enough to be a doc. It's just that I care about my pts too much to be one (if this moron's the criteria...)

You did the right thing. There's a time and place, and the doc was worng about both.

Specializes in M/S, Travel Nursing, Pulmonary.
Ever had a doc in the ER refuse to come eval a pt who'd ripped out a trach at 0300 and was throwing copious amounts of flash edema? And had this doc tell you, "I'll come if you say he's a code." And his rationale? If the ER doc responds to a floor code, he gets paid extra, he doesn't get "paid" to come to the floor -- beyond the 10x my salary he's already making...

It's not that I'm not smart enough to be a doc. It's just that I care about my pts too much to be one (if this moron's the criteria...)

Now thats just scary. I dont get that. My response would have been "Can I write that as a verbal order.........that I must call the code for you to see the pt?"

Specializes in ICU, Research, Corrections.

So, he storms off the unit, makes it clear I am being reported. Nice. And a friend/colleague sitting near at the time tells me I'm disrespectful. Doh:eek:.

OMG, never thought I'd be in a position where I'd have to swing through physicians to get focused on a pt. who is near needing Rapid Response. Now..........I have seen EVERYTHING.

Best part is, this facility is looking for reasons to get rid of people. So yes, on my way home I realize I just gave them reason to. Not very smart on my part.

My place is sort of like your place. I had a doctor YELL at me for the very first time in my career and hang up on me last week. I saw him in person before my shift ended and he was acting quite nice. I told him, "Don't you ever hang up on me again!".

At that point, he wanted to talk to my supervisor. I told him I welcomed him to talk to my supervisor! Job be damned, I will not be disrespected like that.

Luckily, my management supported my views.

Specializes in M/S, Travel Nursing, Pulmonary.
My place is sort of like your place. I had a doctor YELL at me for the very first time in my career and hang up on me last week. I saw him in person before my shift ended and he was acting quite nice. I told him, "Don't you ever hang up on me again!".

At that point, he wanted to talk to my supervisor. I told him I welcomed him to talk to my supervisor! Job be damned, I will not be disrespected like that.

Luckily, my management supported my views.

If only I could be so lucky. IDK, I have this feeling in my gut about all this.

Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.

You did the right thing.

Hope the documentation reflects what interventions were being done for the patient while this doc sat on the sidelines.

I know it's a tight job market, but if you were to lose your job over something this inconsequential, then the job wasn't worth having in the first place......you did nothing wrong, and it sounds like the surgeon was disrespectful to YOU by getting his undies in a wad over something as stupid as 'too many' phone calls....someone has to take care of the patient, and there was no point to his continuing to harp on the subject other than to prove that he can because he is a surgeon and you are 'just a nurse'. I would probably have handled it less gracefully than you did.

Specializes in psych, addictions, hospice, education.

Back in the days when I was a new nurse, I was often the only staff person present on my unit. We cared for lots of eating disordered patients. I had one who kept passing out, falling to the floor, and generally wasn't doing well, due to refusing food and over-exercising. Her potassium level was very low and her pulse was often weak and rapid. One night she had her usual falling-to-the-floor time, at bedtime, and I called the doctor as we did each and every time this happened. The doctor wasn't one who was usually very pleasant to either staff or patients. He ordered a stat EKG and I had that done. It was extremely irregular. I don't remember exactly what it was--this was long ago. Anyway I called him and he was extremely irritated that I had called him to report the EKG results and said "don't call me unless she hangs herself." I wrote that as an order, and documented everything thoroughly in the nursing notes. Ahem. Needless to say he was ready to behead me and do other painful things to me when he read the order. However, my unit manager got to him before he got to me, and all three of us sat down and talked it through. After that he was much more pleasant to me, and would even actually talk with me about patients! Years later we had a good chuckle about that particular incident. I think both of us, immediately after the incident, decided it was a time to learn what we could have done differently, for the benefit of the patient. Incidentally, the patient did improve enough to go home, after a long hospitalization...

Ever had a doc in the ER refuse to come eval a pt who'd ripped out a trach at 0300 and was throwing copious amounts of flash edema? And had this doc tell you, "I'll come if you say he's a code." And his rationale? If the ER doc responds to a floor code, he gets paid extra, he doesn't get "paid" to come to the floor -- beyond the 10x my salary he's already making...

It's not that I'm not smart enough to be a doc. It's just that I care about my pts too much to be one (if this moron's the criteria...)

Actually, I get this doc's perspective. Our ED docs have no ability to write orders or perform care on a admitted patient unless they are in a code situation. They have no privileges to do this, no right to order any type of intervention, and no right to perform anything. He'd be way out of bounds doing so, and would be reprimanded by the Chief of Staff. If he kept doing it, he'd get the boot. It's not about the money; it's about honoring his contract and working within his terms of hire. You can't ask a doc who has no privileges (and most ED docs do not have hospital privileges) to come in, assess, and write orders on any patient.

Do you not have a rapid response team? Our hospitalists and ED docs do have the right to order anything on any patient for whom we've called a code or a rapid response, regardless of who the attending physician is.

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