pamb

I appreciate all the input. I also appreciate the support and confirming comments. I don't think they were forced to hire anyone because of the circumstances of my being hired. If they were forced by medicare/ medicaide, they sure would have followed my suggestions, and maybe, made a plan of correction. I am not going to report this cause the only one who would get hurt is me! Believe me, I did consider the boys medical condition when I said to hold the drug. His wound was healing with no s/s if infection. I felt like we could get more appropriate documentation the next day. He had been on his medication for at least 7 days. I just felt so frustrated due to the circumstances and decisions that were made. This child wasn't hurt but there are reasons we have guidelines in place. Patient safety. The next time an exception is made might be the time someone gets hurt.

This is a not for profit emergency shelter that accepts medicare payment. They have very clear medication administration guidelines from medicare. I have reviewed the guidelines as I gave medication training in the fall. I did not see exceptions to the rules. When the supervisor was contacted that night, I spoke to her and told her I could not support giving the medication. She said that she would just come and give it. I said that would be fine. She called a few minutes later and spoke to the staff I was training. He said, she said ,"just don't worry about it." I left about 930. I came back the next AM and saw the med had been signed out at 945. The med sheet had the childs' name on it. and the times filled out for the night I was there as well as in the morning. The rest of the sheet was blank.(of course, they don't know anything else!) The person that usually signs behind him refused to do so. That is pretty good confirmation that the administration can do what they want to. The eye contact from the guy that gave the medication was absent towards me. So sad. I have the administrators respose on an email I copied. "I am the adminstrator and what we did is within our guide lines" "As the director I have to make decisions like this" They also used the medical consentor term a lot. My take on that is, this is a social worker with child protective services that stretched his authority just a little too far. Naming a medical consentor is an attempt to have checks and balances in place, a way to prevent meds from being prescribed that aren't neccessary.....He too is in violation of the medicare med. admin. guidelines as far as I am concerned. I do feel confident that this kid will be ok and that the medication is probably what they say it is. One of the things that is so frustrating is if I make a big stink they will just get rid of me and continue to do as they are. I don't think reporting this is going to affect any change, just headache for me. I have consistantly run across unethical behavior like this as a nurse.The politics are awful. I had been out of nursing for 5 years due to this kind of stress and trying to do the right thing. I thought this would be a nice calm way back into nursing and I would be helping the kids and education staff. What I have found is staff thinks they are educated enough.LOL I decided to post in here cause I wanted support and confirmation. Thanks to all of you who have responded. Yes this job is going to be short term. I can't work for a place that I can't feel proud of. I have made some small difference while I have been there tho.

I am working as a consultant for a state funded childrens home. Medical staff are not required. I was monitoring a med pass for the purpose of correction and teaching. A child came to the home as a respite client. His medication was in a used pill bottle for another patient. The information was covered up with a piece of paper with the respite kids name hand written on it along with the instructions to give bid. I was told that this med was an antibiotic for a spider bite. There were 4 pills in the bottle. I told staff not to give the meds and the reasons why. Not in original container, no dr. order, no name of medication etc. The supervisor was called and told staff just to wait until I left to give it. I was reprimanded the next day and it was implied that I was not a team player , that I should not have told staff what I thought...don't give the medication, and that what they did was perfectly acceptable. As I see it there are at least 3 state funded facilities that did not follow safe standard medication administration policies in this situation. The home from where the child came from, the medical consentor-case manager from CPS and the facility that I work for. This situation has me really bugged. Any feed back.