I had an odd experience last night at work. I was in my patients room wrangling TPN/LIPIDS and antibiotics on the iv pole while the patient and his family were chatting along. (They speak another language so I pretty much just do my thing quietly).
Anyway I noticed that one of the younger males, who was sitting in the chair facing me, picked up his Blackberry and held it up in front of him like somone does when they are taking a picture. It was aimed directly at me and then he put it down, typed a message and quietly went back to talking. A few moments later he got a text message.
I have been kind of creeped ever since.
I am not the kind of person to confront on a suspicion, so I just let it go and nothing spectacular has happened since. However I was kinda of like...what the eff?
Photography in hospitals in general is usually prohibited by policy simply because of the HIPAA risks. Further, if you did not give permission for your picture to be taken I would ask the person to delete the photograph, and then I would have called security to have him identified, and then removed. If the picture in the hospital setting then shows up on the internet, you or the hospital will then know who to legally go after.
I was going to suggest you dribble some TPN on that there blackberry. Give him some sticky fingers and looked surprised: what's the problem? Would have served him right to be treating you like some objectified nurse servant (ho) etc etc.
I have a blackberry, and unless i manually turn it off, the camera always flashes when I take a pic. It also has a full Qwerty keyboard so it is much easier for me to hold it with both hand and type a message, so he could have actually just been sending a text... I know sometimes it looks like I am taking a pic of someone when I am simply holding the phone to text or send an email because I will hold it up like that so I can see the screen better... but ya never know!
That is what i thought, family has a right to take pictures to their hearts content of their loved one. why would that irk anyone.
because they are already passive aggressive and will most likely be doing it to sue us. It's just rude. You cant wait till Im out of the room to take a picture of it? then they go and say that they showed it to some other doc and that he/she said it was because of some other nurse and it totally was not due to that. It's just more the combination of the family's behavior and the act of taking the pic.
I had a family who asked to take pics to show a lawyer. Not to sue the hospital but so that he could get a stay on a court date for the hospitalized patient. Our risk management officer told me that they could take the pics (after consent was signed by patient or POA). But she stipulated that no staff was to be in the pictures.
So I don't really have a problem with families taking pictures of the patient but if they take a picture of the staff, I would want to know why. In this case, since you aren't sure if the picture was taken, I would probably just let it go. If it happens again, I would ask if they were taking a picture and explain that you would rather not be in the picture.
Like a previous poster said, every Blackberry that I've owned (a few now, lol, I love them) has a flash. I do not know if it is even an option to turn it off because I've never tried? And I also hold my phone up to my face to type and often look like I'm taking a picture....ESPECIALLY when I'm working with a bad signal!
Like a previous poster said, every Blackberry that I've owned (a few now, lol, I love them) has a flash. I do not know if it is even an option to turn it off because I've never tried? And I also hold my phone up to my face to type and often look like I'm taking a picture....ESPECIALLY when I'm working with a bad signal!
Yeah you can go under options and turn the flash off, but I wouldnt do it anyway because it makes the pics turn out bad!!!
If I suspected someone was taking a picture of me I would kindly ask, right then and right there. If they did I would ask that they delete it. If they didn't I would speak with my manager.
I don't blame you for feeling weird. That is weird. As nurses we have to be a little more careful. We are in the public eye a lot. Never be to careful with your own personal safety. It's to easy to come into contact with someone that's not mentally stable.
Specializes in Acute Care Cardiac, Education, Prof Practice.
There was no flash.
I am really not too worried about it. If anything it will show me smiling at my patient and taking great care of him. :) Or it will be shot of my boobs and I will be headless...lol!
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Emergency RN
544 Posts
Photography in hospitals in general is usually prohibited by policy simply because of the HIPAA risks. Further, if you did not give permission for your picture to be taken I would ask the person to delete the photograph, and then I would have called security to have him identified, and then removed. If the picture in the hospital setting then shows up on the internet, you or the hospital will then know who to legally go after.