special treatment for patients/residents with demanding families

[marsy82]

I work in residential aged care, we have an elderly Vietnamese lady with special privileges because her family are very wealthy and are constantly emailing and voicing their concerns about their mother's care. She is physically ok despite random episodes of hypotension, she requires minimal assistance and can mobilize independently. We have been instructed by management that this woman's call bell is answered promptly (within minutes), she is to be informed of our name and position each time we enter her room, her family are allowed access to the kitchen to prepare food that they bring in and we are to stay with her while she uses the bathroom (which is often and can take up to 15mins each time). There are other chronically ill residents with debilitating health conditions that need our attention yet this woman is put before them because her family is difficult ?? Is this a normal practice?

[amoLucia]

Worst part about it is, that families who require "special treatment" are the ones who--upon discharge, complain that the "service" STILL wasn't good enough.

If they were "THAT" concerned about Mother's care, then perhaps they should employ a private duty nurse....

NO, no, no. That would cost them THEIR money!!!

And to xoemmy - In my LTC, we had our medical director's Mom. She was such a polite, gracious lady, A & O, just needing lots of ADL help. We all loved her and her son; he was coop with staff, appreciative of our care, non-complaining. Just like his Mom!

I guess he just knew about catching more flies with honey ...

[ComeTogether, LPN]

When I worked LTC one of our residents was the Mother of one of the two Docs who cared for the residents. She had mild dementia and was feisty. She was a handful to say the least and he knew it. The funny thing is he never expected us to do more for her than we did the rest of the patients. He came to visit every night (which was very helpful when you had questions or needed orders on someone).

YES! I've had a few patients whos children were docs (either in the facility or elsewhere) and the docs never expected more and usually pitched in and helped more but I feel like thats because they KNOW there are other things going on that y'all need to attend to.

[Not_A_Hat_Person, RN]

I'm reminded of George Orwells' book, 1984, and the line I love, "All animals are created equal, but some animals are more equal than others".

It was "Animal Farm", not "1984".

[amoLucia]

It was "Animal Farm", not "1984".

I stand corrected. Thank you.

You know, I kept looking at my post as I was typing and something wasn't just quite right with it. Now I know what. But it's the line that applies.

Again, TY.