Ridiculous, overbearing restrictions on volunteers

[Axmann, RN, BSN, NREMT-B]

Now, while I understand that hospitals have a pecking order, and that usually, at least as I'd like to believe, that pecking order is usually more about protecting patients than protecting the hospital from a lawsuit, but I'm starting to think that things have become very over-bureaucratic and that this immensely slows things down on the floor.

I have heard stories of people getting fired for such small, menial things. I heard that a nurse and a secretary were both fired simply because the nurse asked the secretary for help, and she helped the nurse in in feeding a patient when the nurse asked her to.

Also, when it comes to staff interacting with volunteers, I have noticed many people treat them with unnecessary disrespect. I don't see anything "low" or "bottom rung" about people who would sacrifice their own time without any compensation to come in and give the unit an extra hand. On the contrary, people who give their time for free tend to have much more positive interactions when dealing with patients because they want to be there, they are not required to be there.

I truly believe that if hospitals gave volunteers the ability to perform a greater variety of services in the hospital setting, not only do I fully believe hospital costs would be greatly reduced, I also think that the number of lawsuits that hospitals face would see a general decrease. You would most likely see an increase in overall patient happiness/wellness. Many times I have seen patients become very close with volunteers and greatly enjoy their company.

A passion for helping others that goes beyond money and compensation, especially knowing all of the stress and anger people take out on them, is something (unfortunately) rare in health care. I consider it a blessing and I believe volunteers should, at the very least, be given just as much respect as a nurse, doctor, or any other paid staff member.

[PghRN30]

If volunteers were to do anything medically involved, who's license does that involve? Volunteers are not licensed do do anything medical. For a nurse to have people preforming his/her MEDICAL tasks on his/her license it would provide more variables for things to go wrong. The more variables you allow into a situation where things can go wrong, the more often something will. If that volunteer is dishonest, diverting drugs from patients, or makes a mistake they wont admit to(accidently gives wrong drug to wrong patient maybe......oops did she say room 634 or 643?) or gets side tracked and forgets something the nurse already passed off to them, and thought they were doing/had done, it is the patient that suffers, or possibly dies and the nurse who is responsible.

Even though you do not think so, passing meds IS a medical procedure. Just because it doesnt involve scalples or needles doesnt mean it doesnt require any less medical knowledge and responsibility.

As for the secratary helping to feed someone.....First off, someone that needs someone else to feed them needs that help for some reason......most likely there were medical implications and/or risks involved. One thing nurses are taught to do very early in patient care/nursing skills is how to feed patients. Maybe CNAs/MAs do as well, I am not sure. But beings it was a skill that was taught to a nurse, and had never been taught to a secratary, the secratary should not have been involved.

One thing you should learn is there are always (at least) 2 sides to every story.....and the truth is more often then not somewhere in between. Rarely will a story that someone tells you be all the facts, and thats even when all the facts are truthful. Even if not intending to most people will omit the facts they do not favor, and emphisize the ones they do favor. ie....the secratary and nurse were fired because the nurse asked for help and the secratay helped her.....yes im sure every one of the facts is correct, but im also sure it omits a lot, like that was outside the secratarys scope of practice, what medical conserns were involved with the patient that required being fed, were there previous issues that this nurse and/or secratary had been spoken to about. Usually when people are fired over an insident, it is repeat offence, or it is a SEVERE insident.

[JROregon, ASN, BSN, RN]

I've been through one term of nursing school and have yet to pass an actual patient his meds. Yes, I've passed ibuprofen tablets and liquid to my family members without any problems and prescriptions meds to my kids and haven't felt like it was something I needed to go to school for. However, in the hospital, my patients are sometimes in pretty bad shape. Are they having some respiratory slowing due to the morphine they were given an hour ago? How would you know, what would you look for? What is the antidote for morphine? Did they forget to tell the admitting nurse about an allergy to the antibiotic you are giving them? Would you know to ask and which drugs are the most common culprits of anaphylaxis? Do you know how to check the patients BP before giving him meds that will cause a drop in BP? As far as feeding a patient goes, that job can be delegated to a CNA in my state. The CNA needs to know how to determine if a patient has swallowing issues, what kind of foods that patient can eat, how to check for hidden food, what to do for patients who are choking. I will say it again (someone already posted this), if a patient can't feed herself, she is likely to also be experiencing some level of dyphagia. The rules aren't moronic. The double and triple checking on oral meds and other medications isn't moronic. If you get some type of training in this area, you will find out how important these checks are. I don't ever want to give a patient a drug without knowing how it affects him and what the implications are for his particular condition. That's just nuts.

[happy2learn]

OP is not in nursing school, just so you all know.

I am a hospital volunteer. Sure, I get treated rude by some nurses and doctors and other hospital staff, but not most of them. And the ones that are rude to me are rude to the staff I work with, so it's nothing against me. Maybe you need to volunteer somewhere else. And if you are being treated rude, why don't you stand up to them? You don't have to be rude back, but just let them know that you are treating them in a professional manner, you deserve to be treated the same.

Personally, I like that I am not allowed to do certain things. I am not allowed to get water unless I ask the nurse. I don't want to mess anything up with the patient. I am not allowed to help someone out of the car into the wheelchair (even though I am an STNA and I know how to properly do this.) If I were to get hurt, I wouldn't be covered for my medical expenses. So you know what? I sure as heck don't do things. If I want to watch the doctor or nurse do something (like stitches or cleaning wounds) I am allowed to do that. I can watch. I can't do. I am fine with that! I can learn by watching.

Personally, with the attitude you have in this post and your responses, it seems you may come off with an attitude with other people you work with. You seem to think you are entitled to do what you want. Well, you're not. If you don't like it, no one is forcing you to volunteer. And no one is forcing you to volunteer at the location where you are at. I'm in the ED of a Level 1 Trauma Center. I can transfer around the entire hospital at any time if I want to. I am happy with what I am allowed to do. I volunteer because I want to help the patients and visitors feel more comfortable. I don't volunteer to benefit myself ( though I do learn a lot.) I just like being able to make a positive difference in people's lives.

I suggest that you stand up for yourself ( and YES volunteers deserve AS MUCH respect as paid staff. I can't believe someone insinuated that they do not.) If that does not work, then speak with your manager. If that doesn't work, go somewhere else.

[sandi1743]

I have heard stories of people getting fired for such small, menial things. I heard that a nurse and a secretary were both fired simply because the nurse asked the secretary for help, and she helped the nurse in in feeding a patient when the nurse asked her to.

i am not sure why - but i was thinking about this over the weekend - what the nurse did could be considered to be negligent at least - if this pt needed assistance in eating than perhaps they also have issues with swallowing and chewing - what would the secretary have done if the pt did not crew properly and then choked? pushed the call button and waited for the staff to come?

I do not think that this is a "menial" thing at all.

[Axmann, RN, BSN, NREMT-B]

you have no clue what nurses do or the implications of the professional duties they are responsible for.

You are wrong.

[Axmann, RN, BSN, NREMT-B]

Anyway, I came across an interesting situation the other day. I observed one of the nurses in the unit that I work at ask a volunteer if he would go into a patient room and press the "restart" button on a IV pump. I, of course, thought nothing about it when she asked him to do so, and saw no problem with it. However, the rest of the nurses around at the time went into catatonic seizures thinking that a volunteer was being entrusted with *GASP* any other duty besides making the unit secretary's smoothie.

If you cannot correctly read the word "restart" and press the corresponding button, you shouldn't be around patients anyway. However, no; I do not believe people should require training to press a button correctly.

You seem like an intelligent person, hopefully you can see the web of intricacies that go into just "giving meds to this patient."

Of course I can see the complexities of the situation. I fully understand and comprehend the point every other poster here is making. However, without reform of this overly-bloated system, there will come a point where you have to have a license to enter a patient room. Do families visiting patients have to be licensed to enter their room? Perhaps they had some sort of residual toxin on their clothes that exacerbates the patients' pulmonary issues? Should this make them legally accountable if the patient suffers noncardiac pulmonary edema?

[llg, PhD, RN]

Anyway, I came across an interesting situation the other day. I observed one of the nurses in the unit that I work at ask a volunteer if he would go into a patient room and press the "restart" button on a IV pump. I, of course, thought nothing about it when she asked him to do so, and saw no problem with it. However, the rest of the nurses around at the time went into catatonic seizures thinking that a volunteer was being entrusted with *GASP* any other duty besides making the unit secretary's smoothie.

If you cannot correctly read the word "restart" and press the corresponding button, you shouldn't be around patients anyway. However, no; I do not believe people should require training to press a button correctly.

QUOTE]

This is a good example of "how little you know" and how dangerous you would be if given the opportunity to do the things you want to do.

The reason for people were so upset with the nurse for asking the volunteer to simply hit the "restart" button ... is because that is inappropriate practice for ANYONE, inappropriate even for a nurse or physician to do that. You should never simply start or restart fluid running into a patient until you first asses that the everything is OK with the IV line -- that it is properly hooked up, not occluded, the right fluid is hanging, etc. An experienced nurse would notice these things in a brief moment as she approached the patient, glanced at the equipment, etc. -- but an inexperienced volunteer would simply hit the button without assessing. That would be dangerous and very wrong. The nurse was stupid and negligent to ignore the need for assessment when she asked the volunteer to press the button.

As for the rest of your post -- well that's just ridiculous and you know it. There is a big difference between simply walking into a room and accepting the professional responsibility for the well-being of the patient.

[CuriousMe]

Anyway, I came across an interesting situation the other day. I observed one of the nurses in the unit that I work at ask a volunteer if he would go into a patient room and press the "restart" button on a IV pump. I, of course, thought nothing about it when she asked him to do so, and saw no problem with it. However, the rest of the nurses around at the time went into catatonic seizures thinking that a volunteer was being entrusted with *GASP* any other duty besides making the unit secretary's smoothie.

If you cannot correctly read the word "restart" and press the corresponding button, you shouldn't be around patients anyway. However, no; I do not believe people should require training to press a button correctly.

Of course I can see the complexities of the situation. I fully understand and comprehend the point every other poster here is making. However, without reform of this overly-bloated system, there will come a point where you have to have a license to enter a patient room. Do families visiting patients have to be licensed to enter their room? Perhaps they had some sort of residual toxin on their clothes that exacerbates the patients' pulmonary issues? Should this make them legally accountable if the patient suffers noncardiac pulmonary edema?

Your posts continue to display a lack of understanding. To me, it seems to be the most dangerous kind of ignorance.....you don't know, what you don't know, and you're not willing to listen to those who do know.

I wish you the best in your educational endeavors.

[nohika]

Look, I've been a volunteer in the same place for 9 months now. I've "graduated" to higher responsibilities - fetching water, getting papers/tools for the nurses.

But if one of them - even the charge nurse I /adore/ - asked me to pass "just some pills"? I would have a sharp word with her on that, as politely as I could - I'm a CNA regardless, but HOMG that is out of my scope by SOOOOO far.

We're here to make the nurse's lives a little bit easier - taking patients down, getting food/whatever, fetching papers, helping housekeeping... that's a lot more than some hospitals and positions allow.

[hiddencatRN, BSN, RN]

OP is not in nursing school, just so you all know.

You know, considering the OP's complete lack of respect/basic awareness of what exactly nurses do, I guess this isn't really surprising.

If you cannot correctly read the word "restart" and press the corresponding button, you shouldn't be around patients anyway. However, no; I do not believe people should require training to press a button correctly.

The fact that a task is physically simple and uncomplicated to perform does not mean that you don't require specialized knowledge to be able to carry it out safely and appropriately. Hitting the button is easy. Knowing what to look for before determining it's OK to hit the restart button requires training.

Of course I can see the complexities of the situation. I fully understand and comprehend the point every other poster here is making.

No, you don't.

[Axmann, RN, BSN, NREMT-B]

It also sounds like you don't have a whole lot of respect for the complexities of the job that members of the healthcare team do.

Are you sure you're not just sore that I'm saying that, at the end of the day, just because you passed a test, that doesn't mean you care about helping people any more than a non-licensed person?

It sounds like you don't have a whole lot of respect for the complexities of the job that members of the healthcare team do. Volunteers are part of the healthcare team, whether you'd like to believe it or not. They may not be a gigantic part of it, but there are some volunteers that I would trust with my life 1000x time more than a nurse who doesn't give a hoot about anything other than their paycheck.

The point is, there are some volunteers who care, and some nurses who don't. The nurse may have more book information, but if she tries to avoid her duties as much as possible, when the volunteer would more than love to help out, I believe the volunteer would administer better care than the lazy nurse, even if it is purely holistic care.

[Axmann, RN, BSN, NREMT-B]

This is a good example of "how little you know" and how dangerous you would be if given the opportunity to do the things you want to do.

This is a good example of how little you know.