mauddib

Just to clarify, my message did say that they spotted me and called me over. The prof. also knew this. And as for the 2nd time, my friend was in the hallway and wearing a jacket so I just walked over to say goodbye as I was 10 feet away from him at the time.

First off, thanks for all the responses! Well actually I did tell the professor that they called me into the room while I was walking past it. I hadn't even noticed them at all up until that point. Anyway, I spoke with her via email and she's agreed to meet with me when school re-starts in just over a week to answer my questions. She's very reasonable and always willing to help so hopefully she'll be able to help me out with this. And for the record, I explained to my friend and his parents the privacy rules so that they'd know them to a) feel more secure in the privacy of the Mother and b) so as to understand why I was drawing limitations on our interactions. All of this I told my professor. So I am looking forward to meeting with her outside of clinical to be able to get a fuller understanding of the situation. Or who knows, maybe she's just gonna kick me out of the program I hope not though because I really do like helping people and frankly, she is a very understanding and helpful so it should all be good!

Thanks. I kinda of thought I was following the rules so it was just confusing to basically be reprimanded for it. I think I'll try and formulate a very polite email asking for clarification from my professor. I mean, when I start working professionally this is gonna happen all the time (it's that kind of town). My wife encounters this regularly as a nurse and she just never tells me. I only find out later on when the friend brings it up that he or she was at her hospital and saw her there, which is the way it should be.

So I am about half way through RN school and tonight something interesting happened to me and I have questions that hopefully someone here can help me with. For starters, this took place in NYS. I was on the floor tonight when a friend spotted me and called me over. His mother was a patient on the floor where I was doing my rotation. He introduced me to her and his father and I never asked any medical questions, not even why she was in the hospital. She volunteered a few things on her own but for the most part we just engaged in some chit chat. She was concerned about her allergy to penicillin not being on her wrist band so I promised to ask her nurse for her about checking her record (not me but the attending nurse) and getting back to her about it. I told them about using proper hand hygiene just to be safe and said I would stop in to see if she needed anything later on. I also explained that I couldn't look into her chart or do anything treatment oriented with her, but would be willing to help out in any other fashion I was legally able to. Fresh pillow, sheets, utensils, that sort of stuff. I even told my friend when he told me to send his regards to my wife that I couldn't because of privacy rights. So the problem came later when I saw my friend leave the room with his coat while talking with another student and went over to say goodbye. My professor saw me and told me I couldn't go near any of them because of HIPAA regulations. Now she is more knowledgeable than I by far but I am pretty sure that I wasn't in violation of any laws. Was I wrong? I mean, we're told to help with any and all patient's on the floor and not just the ones assigned to us so this really got under my skin and she didn't seem to have the time or desire to explain this to me. So hopefully someone here can! Thanks in advance.