Patients and their crazy requests

NursingStudent5548 · May 18, 2009

I hate how the few pt/resident ruin it for the majority... I am a CNA in a facility where we obtain all vitals, pass all meals, feed all those who need assistance, bath everyone (whether they want assistance or not), change all linens, empty trashes, transfer all pts to meals, activities and back.

It would really drive me nuts when our MS patient would demand to go out to smoke...We can't have an aid out there for 1+ hours EVERY SHIFT and EVERY DAY. Talk bout customer service eating into a facilities funds if you do the math...just in the time we have a staff member outside with her and their wages it adds up to over $1k per month....she pays $4k and has to have someone in her room non-stop no lie...

You walk out she rings again in a minute...

Put a different movie in I changed my mind

Go buy me some skittles, peanut butter crackers, or some other random item (I am not spending my limited wages for your eating habits)

Yes we too also get the bend the straw request from her numerous times...(she refuses to make an attempt to feed herself) she can stand still, move her arms..(she can answer her phone but not bend a straw)....

I need a new brief (we changed her the last time we were there) we still check but numerous times have to tell her she is dry...

But the icing on the cake....#1 most ridiculous request

She also likes to call the state and claim one staff member broke her arm and her leg....in retaliation to them telling her no(she requested this...male staff member to take her out on a date and to a hotel room after (to spend the night)....on her tab and...he would be compensated greatly for his "SERVICES")

NOT to mention this staff member was my BF and I and another aide was in the room when she made the request in front of her mom....knowing he was my BF!!

Also note....she makes this request to a poor unsuspecting male aide every year and sadly 2 times they have agreed....

Lovely_RN, MSN · May 18, 2009

Go buy me some skittles, peanut butter crackers, or some other random item (I am not spending my limited wages for your eating habits)
OMG, this one burns my butt...these people seem to think that I'm rich! I've had residents ask me buy them things with my own money on multiple occasions. I've also been asked to lend money and I even had two residents try to sell me something. One wanted me to buy the bootleg DVDs that a family member was smuggling in from the outside for her. She was doing a brisk business with the other alert residents and I guess she wanted to expand her client base. Next I had a resident try to sell me toiletries. Where do these people come from?
I've had CNAs tell me how they have been taken by some of the residents who have asked for items and when the CNA bought them they claim they will pay them later and the never get their money back. Also when CNAs take residents out to appointments (escorts) the resident will say they don't want the bag lunch and ask them to buy a meal for them. Stuff like that. I don't make a lot of money and the CNAs make even less so I know that some of them really can't afford to buy items for residents or lend them money without being paid back. It's their own fault though because they know it's against company policy to do this and yet on a weekly basis it seems one gets suckered. You know what makes me madder though? Is that some nurses willingly do this so some residents will tell me but Ms. _________ always buys me things or does this or that for me and now I'm the b*t*h because I don't. You would think that these are the little old ladies and men with no family members but nope it's the ones ages 45-70 who pull the most stunts. The really old and sick ones rarely ask for much and you actually DO feel like buying them the occasional treat or gift because they really don't have anything or anyone on the outside to bring them nice things.
But the icing on the cake....#1 most ridiculous request
This is just nuts
She also likes to call the state and claim one staff member broke her arm and her leg....in retaliation to them telling her no(she requested this...male staff member to take her out on a date and to a hotel room after (to spend the night)....on her tab and...he would be compensated greatly for his "SERVICES")
NOT to mention this staff member was my BF and I and another aide was in the room when she made the request in front of her mom....knowing he was my BF!!
Also note....she makes this request to a poor unsuspecting male aide every year and sadly 2 times they have agreed....

What's crazier is that she has had any takers....they should be jailed for their conduct. Poor un-suspecting male aid my foot! They know better how many times have female CNAs and Nurses been offered sex from male residents? How inappropriate.

What's funny to me is that they lady who sells the bootleg DVDs also loves to call the state on people. I was her favorite nurse until I declined to buy her illegal movies and now I am on her "call the state" list too. :down:

Ruby Vee, BSN · May 18, 2009

i find the more "persistant" (i'm being nice here) patients are the one's from 18 - 30 yrs. of age. they are all angy, and in a hurry, self centered and feel entitled to what they want now !

praiser :heartbeat

i'm with you. i've always found the 18-45 age group to be the worst in terms of being entitled and nasty. the over 50 crowd has always been fairly patient, respectful (at least as much as anyone is respectful these days) and grateful.

Ruby Vee, BSN · May 18, 2009

i hope things get better for you soon.
riginally posted by soundofmusic
these past few weeks have just been silly with patients.

one lady acutally asked me to use her tweezers and pull out any stray chin hairs that she might find in her magnifying mirror she'd brought to the hospital. and she didn't exactly ask nicely -- it was more of a firm request. i told her i had medications to give and excused myself out of her room. sorry, i'm not a chin hair plucker.
are you angry about the demand itself or the demanding demeanor? chin hairs can be quite an issue for women
.

another lady yesterday actually wanted a dr's order for freaking blistex, because she had a cold sore. i'm sorry -- how about walk on down to your local drug store, like everyone else, and buy a $1.50 tube for yourself? but they did it. meanwhile, i have to buy for myself and for my kids every cold medicine on the market because our military clinic won't dispense it as a prescription.
how can she go if she's hospitalized?

i can't get over this generation of people. it's about age 50 to 75. why are they so entitled?? ms. blistex was also mad because between the hours of 8 and 11 a.m. when we were doing vitals, giving meds, baths, getting people to tests, therapies, etc. that we were not responsive enough to her needs. she had no needs -- she was going to be discharged by noon.
did she know that? and what's your definition of "need"? probably differs from hers.

why can't people just be thankful that they have a wonderful hospital in their immediate area w/ the finest doctors who treat them and manage to discharge them in a non-critical status? why can't they just be satisfied that they received medical treatment and are allowed to go home to enjoy their lives? it's all complaints -- from a very spoiled and unappreciative public at a time when hospitals are struggling just to stay open. it all just makes me want to wap them over their collective heads.

sorry for the rant. i'm just so tired of people.

i hope things get better for you soon.

yes, chin hairs can be quite a problem for some women. it would be entirely appropriate for them to ask a cosmetologist, personal body servant or family member to pluck chin hairs for them, but totally out of line for them to request (much less demand) that a hospital nurse pluck chin hairs. as for the blistex -- we do provide it to our icu patients in one hospital; in the other you must send your family member to the gift shop to get you son. and that's another request that's totally appropriate for a visitor who "wants to help." (far more appropriate than letting them rant at mom's nurse to show how much they "care".)

and just about every adult can discern the difference between "i want another cup of ice" and "my roomate needs blood pressure medicine/suctioning/cpr." however in these days of customer service frenzy, we've discouraged "customers" from seeing/acting upon the difference. the original poster was venting. this is a vent thread.

i'm wondering if you work in management. you sure don't get it.

MoLee228 · May 18, 2009

i find the more "persistant" (i'm being nice here) patients are the one's from 18 - 30 yrs. of age. they are all angy, and in a hurry, self centered and feel entitled to what they want now !
praiser :heartbeat

just last week i was given two patients in clinical for the first time. i was definitely ready, i was to the point where i was bored with one. but my heart dropped when i got report and realized both of my patients were 20-something males! i have had no problem with all my sweet, dear 80-90+ patients, but the 20-somethings scare the crap out of me, and i'm 22! it ended up being as rough of a day as i had anticipated: one patient was labeled a drug seeker and refused all of his meds but his dilaudid (which he had to have immediately when it was due, not 2 minutes late, even if it was due at 7:00 during report... :down: ) and the other patient wanted nothing to do with me: "i don't care if i don't shower for a week and my bed never gets made! go away!" :banghead:

haha so yes i wholeheartedly agree that the young'ins are more difficult! i want my sweet little old ladies back! :saint:

NursingStudent5548 · May 18, 2009

When I say poor unsuspecting male aide...I say because of the look of shock and disbelief on my BF's face... I feel sorry for those who walk in and she attempts to "persuade them" ....Now for those that accepted they no longer work at this facility.

Also, there is nothing that could be done to approve that the after hours behaviour occured!!

roseynurse345 · May 18, 2009

I remember a couple years ago, we had a pt who couldn't sleep in the bed or the hospital recliner, and insisted that she have her recliner from home. Guess what? My hospital said ok, it was checked out by bio-med, and was brought in to her room., she had it for the rest of her stay.

rebekaugh · May 18, 2009

Here is the thing, I was in hospitality for many years before becoming a nurse. I got sick of all of the compliants people had with their food, their rooms in hotels and so on... I have since figured out the nursing is guest service. You are just providing a different service. People forget that nurses know more about their health than they do. They have forgotten that nursing is a hard job! people aren't always nice and friendly when in pain and/or sick. We are not the bartenders of pills. We don't get tips, and often we go hours without a break so that we can make sure you will be comfortable. It is sad that nurses have to fight, it seems, to get respect from the patient who feels better because of what we do.

You don't make the people who serve/make you food mad, trust me, why would you aggrivate the one cleaning your wounds, assessing your pain levels and giving you a bed pan.

ok that's my rant with guest service/ nursing issues

travel50 · May 18, 2009

Hey, now, just b/c someone is in management doesn't mean they don't understand!!! (Note Ruby's post above). I am a DON in a nursing home, and I certainly do understand. And I think we all need a place to vent without expecting to be criticized for it. It often gives me a laugh at the end of a long day to read these posts.

At the nursing home we have some winners. I mean, we love them, but oh my goodness, they have their moments! The worst one has to be the lady who wants us to rub her lady partsl cream on despite the fact that she is fully capable of doing it herself. "Put it right there, all around, now inside, oh that is not good enough, you have to get it up inside. Deeper, deeper, keep going, ah that is better, you're about to get it, oh, keep going...ah..." at which point my poor unsuspecting new nurse is horrified and comes running to me. I marched down the hall and told this lady not to ever do that to one of my nurses again, ever. I told her if she wanted a sex toy, we'd get her one, but my nurse is not your sex toy. I did not yell or get ugly, but I was nicely firm.

Of course, then there is the man who wants to stand there and argue with me that he is choking. He gives me a dissertion why this is a fact. I just stare at him in disbelief until he gives up and walks away.

And yes, we have one who will sit in his chair in his room, screaming bloody murder, rather than turn on his call light, all to tell (not ask) us to bend his straw for him. He uses all 4's just fine.

Then in the middle of the nite, a resident turns on the call light to ask who that lady in the red dress was that was just in his room??? We assume it is his schizophrenia acting up until a lady on the other hall, in her right mind, calls and asks the same thing. Now that is freaky!

cmyersRN · May 18, 2009

My craziest request in the last few months came from the mother of a 23yo male who had been admitted to our floor following a lap appy. She was one of those OCD mothers who demanded a private room for him and then proceeded to live there until his discharge and was constantly on his call light demanding anything and everything. He stayed for four days!! She felt he wasn't strong enough to go home yet. The day of discharge she asked his surgeon if he would arrange for her son to get a handicap sticker/tag for his car so he wouldn't have to walk so far to class at his college. PLEASE!!! A lap appy does not make you disabled!! His MD was very polite her when telling her no, but then came into the nurses' station to beat his head against the wall. :banghead:

ktwlpn, LPN · May 18, 2009

" personal body servant " :chuckle

That's exactly how some patients treat us. And what is it with the MS personality? Every bit as charming as the COPD'er...One of our MS ladies asked us to trim her "down there" hair over the weekend. She is on coumadin so no cna is getting near that area with a sharp object-and with 42 residents and 2 nurses this weekend we weren't going there either.

I told her months ago when she asked for a wax that if she got an order from the doctor to permit it she and her husband could hire a cosmetologist to come in and do it for her.That morphed into her telling staff this weekend that I said "They told me my husband could cut it for me" Um-no-that's NOT what I said. They don't pay her dental and eye doctor bills-I'm sure she is not going to get a "groomer" in there any time soon. I'm sooo tired of the entitled,too.

I toileted one of our newer residents the other day-I assumed she really just needed steadying because I have seen her mobilize her w/ch around the unit and I know she can dress and undress herself .Everything was"I'll let you push me over there ,dear" and "I'll just let you pull my pants down,dear" "I'll just let you wipe me honey-then I don't have to wash my hands-my show is coing on now" .....Why don't you just let me pee for you,too?

VivaRN · May 18, 2009

I am running into the outpatient version of this entitled behavior and it is driving me CRAZY. No, you cannot miss your appointment and then walk in at 4pm demanding to be seen because you have seasonal allergy sx and never took your Claritin. Go to the ER if it's so bad you are going to throw the world's largest tantrum in the waiting room if I can't see you RIGHT... NOW... !!!!!!

I hate being manipulated by patients who make their complaints sound so awful and terrible, I squeeze them in around my patients who KEPT their appointments, only to find that the 10/10 abdominal pain has been going on for 7 years... the patient wanted someone to yell at (yours truly), or the real problem is "I didn't get my mammogram appointment in the mail." Now I'm behind, and made my patients who are actually sick wait. Oh it burns me up. I wish I had a truth-o-meter.

I understand why this population (mentally ill, substance abuse) behaves this way - working with society is not their specialty. But it's still a lot to handle during a day already packed with patients.

Phew. It's been a rough Monday.