tavalon

The one I'm going through right now. After 18 years as a nurse, being sued, learning about the meat grinder that is the legal process of malpractice. I'm unsure that anyone survives, except maybe the lawyers taking their 30% off the top. Realizing that there is a code of silence, encouraged by the lawyers and risk management but even more devastating. Talk about being back in my childhood: Don't Talk, Don't feel, Don't heal. I worked too hard to heal myself to feel like I'm back at step one. I'm looking for a support group specific to healthcare providers who have been faced with this hell. One of the treatments for PTSD (of course, I have it!) is finding a support group of people facing similar trauma. Anyone know of any? Serious request! That I adore my patients and their families and that I can't think of anything else I want to do are the only things keeping me in nursing right now.

Thanks. I'm currently looking for a lawyer and will bring him/her to the meeting. Do I need to notify the risk manager/hospital attorney that I will be bringing my own attorney, I wonder?

Should I bring my own attorney?

I was a Labor and Delivery nurse for 17 years until I blew out my C5 trying to keep a patient from falling. Now, for the last 9 months, I have been a NICU nurse in a level 3 (really more of a level 2 and they lack the staff to train me on the important things like vents and chest tubes). The only nearby hospitals I see are Good Samaritan and St. Claires. Am I missing any and can anyone who works in NICU in any of them give me some insiders scoop? Thanks. Ps This is Washington State, not Delaware.

I had a patient tell me she was having contraptions in her eucharist. As I knew she was a Catholic and that she was trying very hard to get it, I was able to walk out before I laughed. This was 15 years ago and I still remember it. After she had her baby, I helped her learn the words correctly. She was very receptive and very interested and I made sure to be very not teasing. But I've always remembered it and when I hang up from a triage call and a nurse asks me what's up, I usually say "she has contraptions in her eucharist!". May the Catholic God forgive me!

Amen! Magnet is such a joke!

Nope. Not unless they are risking their licenses. However, every L/D nurse ends up delivering a baby from time to time, when the doctor doesn't make it in time.

Uh-oh what happened with Laura? Yes, we need a national union. We need to stop acting like the abused wives and we need to join together. They always have us over a barrel because we are so quick to destroy our own.

I think a fair policy would be the same policy that is implemented for physicians. They are professionals and we as RNs are professionals so we should have the same policies. What, you say the physicians don't have any policy around sick call ins? hmmmmmmmmmm

Alas, that won't work here because every hospital in Austin has the same sort of BS. I'm moving to the great Northwest and it isn't soon enough. Goodbye to the South. Yeehaw.