Pts who insult you?

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im a baby-faced nurse with a young voice and a mousey demeanor, i have pts who i have to wake up to give their 5 am ( shift ends at 6:30 a) meds.

one pt keeps always insulting me, and made a rhyme with "danger, danger [my name] always waking me up and ruining my day and walking out of the room when i told her not to" ( no neglect he was just insulting me from the night before and i wasnt going to deal with it)

how do i stop it??? he keeps saying more and more stuff to me and i usually just explain the same thing i always do. his 5 am meds are important because the doctor ordered it. you have to take it before your other meds so it works. he usually shutsup but i cant deal with it. apparently he keeps talking about me to the other nurses and its frustrating. im just doing my job!!!

the other nurses roll their eyes at it since its all recorded im giving the meds but at some point i need to figure out how to get him to stop being such a dickhead

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Ahem. Sorry. I think you should ignore it, of course. No way would I give someone the satisfaction of upsetting me with such stupid behavior.

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Specializes in Travel, Home Health, Med-Surg.

Some people will always act like this no matter what your demeanor, and that is why the other nurses are probably just rolling their eyes (this unfortunately is just par for the course). You can try to set limits with some but sometimes it is easier to ignore depending the actual behavior and how on long the pt will stay, acute care vs LTC etc.

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Specializes in Cardiac Stepdown, PCU.

What med? Ive had plenty of patients who don't want to be woken up for meds. That's fine. You work with them and the MD to move the med to another time.

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Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.

You cannot change another person. The only person you can change is yourself.

So, either make up your mind not to let it get to you, or work with his doctor to change the time of his medication.

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Specializes in school nurse.

On top of that, the patient's rhyme doesn't rhyme...

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Specializes in ICU, LTACH, Internal Medicine.

I took into wearing maxi skirts at work recently and just found out that one good thing about them is that I do not risk making them wet when laughing

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Specializes in CMSRN, hospice.

Regardless of what you do, he could choose to act juvenile anyway - but he will definitely keep it up if he sees it gets to you. Just do your job and leave! You don't need to bond with every patient and you don't need to fix his behavior. And yeah, he can refuse to take meds at a certain time, even against recommendations. Educate, document, advocate (if it's just the timing of the needs, maybe there's another way they can be scheduled), and move on with your life!

I am always the first to say that nurses should never have to come to work expecting verbal or physical abuse, but this sounds like a cantankerous old man who likes to get under people's skin when he can. Maybe it's his only source of entertainment, depending on where you work.

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Specializes in Dialysis.

just tell him flattery will get him nowhere...he'll either laugh or stop and think. See if you can get the med time changed. When I worked LTC, I had all of the levothyroxine changed to Hs after other meds, if thats the one giving you fits

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You tell him..take your meds, or not dude. The patient is free to refuse. All you have to to do is chart that the patient refused. Notify the doc.. and move on.

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Can't the timing of these meds change? Are they specific meds that are required at 0500?

I'm sorry, if I'm old and need to be in a home for my final days, don't wake me up every dang morning at 5 for meds. I'd probably be unhappy too.

That's just me. I'll be THAT person that nurses will come on here to complain about someday because I like my sleep. Lol.

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Specializes in Disaster, Conflict Mgmt.

I think its important to understand and acknowledge that this patient is (or sounds) very, very immature. Unless that radically change behavior, all you can do is continue to explain why you are doing this (unless you have options re: moving the med time). Have you tried to engage with him more deeply, or have you asked, what alternative would you like (within the abilities of your self and unit)? Or, is there sometimes I can do to make these early morning meds easier?

But yeah. He sounds slightly immature.

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