The upper management staff came unit to unit explaining to us (wispering mind you) of the need to speak quietly and not to raise the voice - EVER.
Some crap about CMS, hospital scores, medicare reimbursment and $$$ - I tuned them all out because in my honest opinion - YOU ARE IN AHOSPITAL, NOT A MONASTERY.
If you want peace and quiet, then go home - I will gladly show you the way out.
Its a new motto - SHHHH (Silence Helps Healing Happen Here).
When will the powers that be realize that I am there to work and keep patients from dying and treat them. I am not there to make them feel like they are at the Ritz-Carlton.
Imagine a code - Wispering the code call, silently doing compressions.
Specializes in Cardio, ED, Case Mgmt, UM, Recruiting,.
When I was in the hospital following the birth of my child a few years ago, I actually had to ask to be moved to a room away from the nurses station because I was frequently awakened at night by the noisy staff. And these were staff members just standing around socializing, not conducting the necessary work of the unit.
A few years later I was in day surgery waiting to have a procedure done, and 2 staff members were outside my room and one said to the other "Welcome to hell", then went on to talk about how busy they were that day. Imagine how I felt as a patient, wondering if I was going to get the care that I needed there in "hell".
I know that many nurses are discouraged about the emphasis on customer service these days, but I think that it needs to be accepted as a fact of life. It isn't going to change. And it actually probably has been a missing element for far too long. (And I have been a nurse for 25 years.)
Have you seen the stop lights some places use to remind about quiet? They detect levels of noise and light up as yellow and red levels are reached. Lately, I've never seen one operational. They were irritating, so staff disabled them in more than one place in which I've seen them! Sometimes management just doesn't think about implications of things they want to implement...
We've got one of those on my floor. The thing blinks yellow constantly, even if there's no noise at all. I work nights, so there are rare moments when it is silent. Still yellow. Very silly and pointless.
Maybe you should look into a different career path Abbaking. If you can't be bothered to be quiet-something that takes less energy than being loud-for your patients' benefit, you have no place in nursing. Sleep is essential to healing and feeling well. Kindly leave the profession if you think otherwise.
Maybe this goes deeper than your superiors scalding you, or maybe you've always had a problem with being told what to do. But they're management they are there to MANAGE you.
Thank you dear...perhaps you should refrain from a condescending attitude and listen to what I was saying in the first place.
My dear, I have seen one to many people on allnurses.com and in person with attitudes like yours - the superior, know it all, brown nosers.
This goes to you and everybody reading this post - Walk a mile in my shoes before jumping to the conclusion that I am some antisocial, defiant and irresponsible passover.
Quietness and hushed tones in healthcare would be nice but the reality is on a intermediate/telemetry care unit with monitors, iv pumps, frequent vitals, etc - total silence (as our managment team had alluded to) is nearly impossible.
I want thank everyone who is in agreement with studentgolfer's assessment of me as a person and as a professional. You have proven to me what I have long known about nursing.
I try to be quiet for my patients, some things can't be helped, but healing requires rest. My family recalls when I was a baby in NICU for 6 weeks, how little sleep I got because the lights were always on. To this day as an adult, my sleep cycle is still completely messed up. I think sometimes we don't realize how much environment can affect people.
I do get annoyed with people who have never done our job or have been away from the bedside for many years telling us how to do our job when they haven't a clue.
My issie was the manner with which the upper management addressed this - it was as if they were talking to kindergardners and not the professionals we are "We Need to use our indoor voices".
I, myself have been a patient and most of the excessive noise i can remember came from other patients (confused, screamers, pain, etc) and the unit carts, phones, call bells, and visitors. The nursing staff was (for the most part) trying to maintain hushed tones both for the day and night shift.
We have the stop light thingy on our unit but its a joke for most staff -
My issue with this whole schpeel is how the nursing is ALWAYS blamed for any wrong or problems. I am getting fed up with management pointing fingers at the bedside staff for all the problems in life and expecting us to Smile and blah, blah, blah.
If management was serious about noise reduction they'd limit and restrict the visiting of patients - BUT that would mean going back on their promise of 24/7 visiting.
There is nothing worse than doing rounds at 2am to find Billie Joe and Billy Bob coming onto the unit with cheap malt alcohol, KFC, and smoking cigarettes....all the while disrupting the unit and making a scene.
My last place of employment was an open door visitor policy. It was a nightmare. I'd get all kinds of 'interesting' folks coming in the door at wee hours of the night and it was not to be therapeutic to the patient (trust me). I also shuddered when I would walk in to do my hourly rounds ever so quietly only to find two people laying on the floor snoring or passing gas, blocking my way to the IV pump and bathroom to empty the urinal.............all while the pt was wide-eyed and annoyed (yet they don't want you to ask them to leave because they feel bad).
My current places has a strict visitor policy. Only one person may sleep overnight with the patient everyone else must go at 2000. We reopen again at 0800. No visitors wanting to be fed or pampered! It is announced over the intercolm, we round and tell them and so does security. This has been tremendously therapeutic in patients to get better rest at night. There are still noises that cannot be controlled like the annoying call bell, others in pain etc but for the most part I have never seen any nurses running up and down the hall, yelling across the way or acting foolish and disturbing pt's. When I work nights, I honestly want nothing more than for them to SLEEP.
By the way, the hospital units close for report as well. Only one visitor may stay in the room with the door closed while we report off. In the NICU, no one may stay until we reopen. We also close down the unit during critial admissions and codes.
In the adult floors, the same goes. Pt's and visitors are instructed on this on admission. Report is faster and more effectively this way. The aides come in half hour before we do, report off and are out of report before the nurses are and are monitoring the pt's for falls and getting them set with water etc.
JMHO....visiting hours are so much better than open season on the hospitals. For noise reasons, rest, and for those patients who just can't boot people out on their own...it's a way to advocate for the patients across the board. Obviously, if someone is dying or in really bad shape, exceptions can be made. But for a grown adult to need someone around 24/7 is a bit much, IMO. The whole "customer" mindset is a disservice to what the person is there for. If they want to be a customer, go to a spa
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
maybe you should look into a different career path abbaking. if you can't be bothered to be quiet-something that takes less energy than being loud-for your patients' benefit, you have no place in nursing. sleep is essential to healing and feeling well. kindly leave the profession if you think otherwise.
maybe this goes deeper than your superiors scalding you, or maybe you've always had a problem with being told what to do. but they're management they are there to manage you.
this is unnecessarily harsh. i suspect abbaking's issue isn't with "being bothered to be quiet" but with management's approach to the issue. if you're a manager, perhaps you should try being more respectful of your staff. certainly you could be less confrontative with abbaking.
I am truly getting sick of working in hospitals. I care dearly about the patients. They are not the problem. I enjoy the camradarie with other nurses. I like learning. I cannot stand Press Ganey. I do not know what it is that makes me so crazy. I did an agency assignment to a hospital this past week. Everywhere there were press ganey signs. Many like the above poster said. Some were "smile". Some were "be nice". They also had scripts that we were supposed to say. I have about had it with all this crap. I consider myself a nice person but I am old enough to not need someone to tell me how to be nice!
He who pays the piper dictates the tune. Until you start calling the shots, I'm afraid, it's smile and like it, you know:).
NurseAnnie123
33 Posts
When I was in the hospital following the birth of my child a few years ago, I actually had to ask to be moved to a room away from the nurses station because I was frequently awakened at night by the noisy staff. And these were staff members just standing around socializing, not conducting the necessary work of the unit.
A few years later I was in day surgery waiting to have a procedure done, and 2 staff members were outside my room and one said to the other "Welcome to hell", then went on to talk about how busy they were that day. Imagine how I felt as a patient, wondering if I was going to get the care that I needed there in "hell".
I know that many nurses are discouraged about the emphasis on customer service these days, but I think that it needs to be accepted as a fact of life. It isn't going to change. And it actually probably has been a missing element for far too long. (And I have been a nurse for 25 years.)