Student nurse gets the boot...veteran nurse fired

[C287]

The worst thing happened to our nursing class today and I just really need to talk to someone other than my fellow students and my family. A couple of students were in the OR observing during clinicals this week and asked a nurse to snap a photo of them holding some recently removed body tissues--in the background of the photo you could see the patient's stomach a little. She posted the photo to her facebook page under all the rest of her nursing school pictures. Someone emailed the photo to our program director. The student who posted it to her facebook has been kicked out, the other one in the photo reprimanded, and the nurse who took the photo has been fired from the hospital. I'm not sure what to be most upset about...the thought that perhaps another student who was a FB friend of this student's emailed this photo with the intent of getting that student kicked out of the program (we are not allowed to have our cell phones) or the fact that the nurse who took the photo was fired (when I worked with her I believe she has been a nurse for 20 some odd years) or the fact that the rest of us have to go back there on monday morning and deal with the consequences and worry about having to lose the nursing school's contract with the hospital--if not for us, for future students! man this all a mess:crying2: sorry about the sloppy writing--I'm distressed.

[Ruas61, BSN, RN]

o0 0o

I am glad I am an oldster and came up in the less techno days.

All these gadgets have brought wonderful things but we have lost so much.

They got what they deserved without question.

[UpstateNyDollCna]

If that was my classmate I would not be sad for her, I would be ******, like someone else mentioned the staff at that hospital will probably be mad or hostile towards your class since, one of their friends/co-workers got fired in connection to some students and also it might have been possible the hospital wouldn't want your class to come back because you might cause more problems. I'm sure your class will be watched extra careful now.

[Rabid Response]

I'm reading this while recuperating from a surgery I had three days ago, in which I did have part of an organ removed. Really the thought that some silly nursing students and (I'm sorry but it must be said) a callous OR nurse would think it was amusing to post with my removed body part for a photo on freaking Facebook has brought tears to my eyes. My God, HIPAA aside, where was the sense of common decency for a fellow HUMAN being??? Really a nightmare for anyone who has been a surgical patient. Those students and the nurse got at least what they deserved. Why would you think otherwise?

[C287]

I'm sorry my original post did not express my feelings about patient care; I should not have assumed that people would just know that I do feel that protecting the safety and privacy of my patients is my first concern. Although I am new to AN, I am not new to the medical profession. I have worked in two ancillary departments in one of our local hospitals for seventeen years, as a teenager I was a candystriper there, and now I'm in nursing school. It's is not that I do not feel their punishment was not warranted. I know that it was--in fact, where I work (I don't know about the clinical site's policy) all HIPAA violations are investigated and then reported to our state's department of health and human services. I just couldn't believe they all just let this happen without a care or a thought about all of the people's lives this would affect. That is what I was so upset about when I wrote the first post; and, absolutely, the patient on the table was foremost. This is just awful from every angle I've looked at it. If I had been there I would have said what the bleep are ya'll doing--that's disgusting, disrespectful, and illegal (I sometimes don't filter myself too well); it might have come out rather brazen but I would have had the patient's and their best interest at heart. Please forgive my failure to slow down and clarify that.

[C287]

Sorry for double responses; I thought I would be able to send Rabid Response a copy to her box in case she doesn't read this blog again.