Patients Treat Nurses Like Garbage!

[lisa41rn]

I don't know what it is. Last week I had five patients one day, all were demanding and miserable. This week I had another group of miserable demanding patients. I happen to see nurses who speak rudely to patients and my thought has always been that the patients pay a fortune for their care and deserve a caring, nice and knowledgeable nurse. I'm starting to think otherwise and see why so many nurses speak up to the patients. In the past, I've nearly always taken a difficult patient and could bring out the best in them. My recent patients are just so rude. I'm the first to have the common sense to realize their illnesses are often new and anxiety can bring out the worst in people. Regardless, it doesn't give them the right to treat those caring for them the most, like garbage. I'm fortunate that I don't need to work and really wonder if I want to go to work, a job I once loved, to be treated terribly. I know many nurses I work with, who are honest, admit they would love to leave and do something different, but often don't have any other options but to be a nurse. How do you all deal with your rude patients??

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

i saw an excellent example of limits yesterday from one of the nurses. we have a patient that "likes" her pain meds and phenergan. we have set strict limits on when she can get it which of course does not mean that cannot be on the call light continuously. when i was talking to the patient i noticed that her nurse had written in big letters the schedule of her pain and nausea meds on the white board. above that was "next pain med 930" "next nausea med 1000". while i was there she came in changed the times and gave the meds. it sits right at the end of the bed and is a good reminder when the patient can call.

excellent idea -- for those who are basically cooperative but forgetful. it isn't going to do a thing for those who are sneaky and manipulative.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

sorry that's been your experience. most places where i have worked, the patient is always right, the nurse is wrong.

that's been my experience as well! and if it's a dispute between a physician and a nurse ("i know my partner ordered those pain meds. he says he did. your nurse just misplaced that page of the chart!") the physician is always right. if it's a dispute between a nurse and pt ("your nurse wouldn't let me do my job! i don't have to stop just because of a little v tack!") the pt is always right. and so on.

i want to find me one of those jobs where management actually listens to the bedside nurse before deciding who is right!

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

i'm sick and tired of hearing the excuse that these people are acting this way because they're ill and stressed. and i wish like hell nursing instructors would stop drumming this crap into students' heads. all that does is perpetuate the stereotype of the nurse as a long-suffering martyr.

i've been in this business long enough to recognize the difference between patients (and families) acting out from illness and stress and those who are simply a horse's ass.

"stress" ain't got nothin' to do with it. and i refuse to excuse that behaviour.

/rant

you've got that right! no matter how ill and stressed you are, you don't have a right to treat anyone like crap! i can understand how someone who is ill and stressed might forget some of the little niceties of social intercourse, but there is no excuse for hitting, kicking, name calling, biting, spitting, threatening and lying. illness and stress might excuse your forgetting to say "thank you" before you turn and barf into the basin that was just handed to you; it does not excuse throwing the contents of said basin at the nurse because "you should have gotten it faster!"

the public didn't used to behave like this -- the horse's ass factor has definitely increased dramatically!

but then i don't remember nursing school teaching me that i have to tolerate that sort of thing, either. it's something new that's come down the pike along with press gainey. nursing has taken a giant step backward.

[AuntieRN]

had a frequent flyer in the ER i used to work at that was incredibly racist and was verbally abusive to the black nurses and techs.

one night, he got assigned to a travel nurse from jamaica. unfamiliar with mr. sunshine, when she entered the room to greet him, he dropped the N-bomb like no body's business and screamed as loud as he could for help.

i went in there and said "Mr. W, what is your emergency." he said "well, you see, i dont understand why you people keep sending these n---- nurses in here". at this point the nurse was already in tears.

so i said "Mr. W, is it correct that you are here because you are having difficulty breathing and think you are having a heart attack?"... he said yes. and "is it correct that you do not have an advanced directive in your chart and would like to be resuscitated if your heart stopped?"... he looked at me like i was stupid, but again he said "no i sure dont and i want everything done for me"

so i posed him the question... "would it be ok then, to have a colored nurse perform CPR on you, or would you rather us let you go since there aren't any white nurses on duty this evening?"

he apologized to his nurse and never spoke the N-word in that ER again.

ohhhh allison2008 you are the bomb! I love the way you think!!! There are many times when I wish I could just put a family member or patient in their place.

We have a frequent flyer who is homeless, drinks and smokes too much and is hooked on pain meds. His doc was away and he thought he had the covering doc fooled into giving him "better" pain meds, guess the q4hr percs and the q2hr ativan and q6hr phenergan just wasnt enough for him. Well what she ordered was Toradol IM. Now I have had Toradol IM and ohhhh does it hurt. I warned him it was gonna hurt I do not believe in lying to my patients. He screamed that I couldn't give him something for pain that was gonna hurt him. Well I finally convinced him it was this or nothing. My charge nurse told me I did have a little evil in me because I told him to roll over with a smile on my face and gladly gave him that IM shot. It was only the second IM injection I had ever given LOL.....(even though I explained what Toradol was...he told me it made him finally pain free and higher then a kite...his exact words..LOL "

[sophie_bob_kids]

I'm so sorry that you are having to deal with this type of behavior. Especially when you go out of your way to treat them with respect. Well, I come in to work with a clean slate. What gets written my slate for each patient depends on how they act towards me. If they respect me, I'll treat them like a queen/king. I may even go out of my way and do things that I wouldn't normally do for them (like going to get coffee, coke, all the waitress type things I don't plan on doing if I'm really busy with patient care.)

But if they are rude to me, they can forget the extras. And where I usually rush to get the call light, I may take a few seconds longer than normal. I won't chit chat with the rude ones and won't ask if they need anything. The rude one will always have to call for what they need. And if they really act up, then I'll just let them know about it. I have had to bring one lady to tears.

But, I didn't say anything out of the way to her. I just told her that she was out of line talking to me like a dog. I also told her that I had had enough and wasn't going to tolerate it any longer. I guess it was shocking to her and it hurt her feelings. Oh, well. I guess I don't have feelings since I'm just the nurse, do I? :angryfire

Gee. I wonder why your pateints are rude.

[rph3664]

I posted this in the male nurse forum under the title "Nurse Story" but here goes.

A while back at the hospital where I work, there was a middle-aged male patient who was harassing nurses. Grabbing their behinds, pulling their tops our so he could look down them, that kind of thing. The floor decided to assign all male nurses to him, which only made things worse since he made derogatory assumptions about their sexuality.

They brought in a 6'8", 400 pound male nurse from another floor. He walked in, introduced himself, and said, "We don't harass the nurses in this hospital."

Problem solved.

Thing was, he couldn't have been that sick if he was capable of doing things like that (JMHO).

[aerorunner80, ADN, BSN, MSN, APRN]

I've noticed this too and I've only been working as a tech/CNA for 7 months.

I wanted to chime in because of a particular patient that I had a while back. This guy was very demanding and rude. He would treat the nurses like crap and order them around. I wasn't aware of this at the time but we were talking about it later.

I go into his room for the first time on my shift and he starts ordering me around. First I look at him like he is a complete idiot (because he was). He was ordering me to hand him his crutches. I told him that I would do it this one time but if he kept talking to me like that I wasn't going to do it again. I also told him that he needs to treat me with the respect I deserve.

I was nervous about saying this to him because that was the first time I had to "put a pt in thier place". I was worried I would get yelled at but nothing came of it.

I agree that we don't have to put up with this kind of crap and I refuse to. I'm not there to be treated like a servant and I absolutely won't take it.

I also recently had a patient who was manipulative and just wanted attention so he would call for "help" back into bed. After the second time of him calling for "help" to get back and seeing that he could do it just fine on his own, I told him that he doesn't need to call for help since he can do it on his own. I didn't get any more calls from him for help back to bed after that.

It can be stressful for us but we need to speak up for our own rights. Our patients aren't afraid to speak up for themselves so why are we so afraid?

If I'm going to get fired for standing up for my own rights then I don't want to work at that place anyway.

That's how I see it.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

[bANANA]If I'm going to get fired for standing up for my own rights then I don't want to work at that place anyway. [/bANANA]

:yelclap::yelclap::yelclap::yelclap:

[bradleau]

I have had patient's family members,who sleep all night in the pt room accuse the staff of not coming in to see mama or daddy. ( makes no difference if mama or daddy says we were there several times) SO I MAKE SURE THE NEXT NIGHT TO TURN ON ALL THE LIGHTS, BUMP INTO THEIR COT, ETC. You see, they get the message. I do not say one word about what they had accused me and my team members of not doing. I must say I DO LOVE THAT TYPE OF REVENGE. Many a patient will tell me what an ass their family member is once that ass is out of the room.

When I did private duty cases, sometimes to get a bit extra cash, I had one patient who truly did not need even a sitter, request that I sleep on the floor at the foot of her bed. Of course I did not do this as I am paid to stay awake. I sat in a chair in the hallway, reading. I found out later that this was an custom from slavery days. I can be so out of the loop sometimes. By the way, I am white, but I can imagine what could have happened if I wasn't and had been more informed. ( NOW A NICE WARM BED?) LOL

[dabuchan]

I am a Canadian R.N. and when I graduated in 1991 we had an abundance of nurses employed in our hospitals, plus we are unionized. (whole other issue).This made it difficult for a new grad to land a full-time position. I could not survive, pay my student loan or even get a loan for a car with my on- call casual position until i could acquire the hours for enough seniority to even apply for the already scarce permanent positions, so i was fortunate to travel nurse and work in Texas, taking on Cardiac Telemetry in San Antonio, Beaumont, and Baytown, where the people and my patients where so kind, and thankful. Texans are very friendly people, and most families that I came in contact with teach their young to use polite and respectful words. It was almost embarrassing the treatment I received, not only as a Nurse but a member of their community. I am sorry you are experiencing such poor attitudes from your patients. Maybe a change of environment is in your horizon. One cranky patient is enough let alone FIVE! Not all your patients are carrying health insurance either which could be real stress issues for a majority of your patients. A lengthly illness can be a costly burden for a lot of families, something us Canadians take for granted with free health care. My American patients for the most part where a lot sicker and farther advanced in their illness, waiting longer to seek medical attention than my Canadian counter parts. People may have too much expectations on the care givers to cure them of their ailments in a short period of time..I guess you have to show patience with your patients eh! I'm sure its not you they are angry at, its the whole hospital experience. I also find 5-6 patients in primary care is way to much of a work load for Nurses. I had experienced that work load in Baytown Tx and that was burn out waiting to happen. Lucky, I was younger and full of energy then because at age 46..no way I could take on that assignment. Try not to be rude, be your patient's advocate, treating all your patients with the same care and respect. Your actions speak louder than words most of the time. Prioritize your patient assignment because your sickest person is has to come first. Good luck... Dabuchan R.N.C.C.N.

[GrnHonu99, RN]

wow im glad i found this thread, i was going to start one just like it. I had a pt. last evening who just burned me up. We were getting along wonderfuly until I got a new admit...needless to say I was tied up for a minute..literally..the pt. next door was fuming I wasn't "at her bedside" when she needed me. I explained to her that I was tied up with my other pt at the moment. She goes through the whole ramble-called me a not nice name, told me i give horrible care, then precedes to tell me that she is american born, not mexican and she has "good" insurance. Like I even know what insurance she has...

point is....she treated me like a servant. She actually said to me "when i call you, that means i need you and you need to get in here". I literally responded to her call light about 5 minutes after it went off. She wanted on the bedpan for the 8th time that night in which she never did anything. Meanwhile i'm admitting a possibly unstable c3-7 spinal injury....she demands i call her MD...what so he can punish me??..yeah not going to happen.. Sigh..i just nodded and said uh huh...easier than fighting it...she eventually got over it. Geez if we could only have 10 hands and be in 5 places at a time! The whole customer service thing is out of control...really this isnt the hilton!

[qpmz]

:uhoh21: I had just had to respond to this thread. I am terribly appalled at all of the stories of management and physicians not listening to the nursing staff in regards to inappropriate behavior. I guess I am fortunate to work for a hospital network that does support their staff and have even been notified in report that the physician is aware of the paitent's manipulative behavior. All I can say is that as nurses we should demand support from our organizations that we deserve and work so hard for.