That Stupid Door!!!!

[Mystery5]

I'm so sick of regulatory oversite by out of touch idiots!!!

We have a 2 doors to our med room. They used to let us prop the main one open but a year or two ago they put those stupid code button thingies on the doors. The side door has a simple 1,3,5 code that opens easily. But the main one that attaches to the nurse's station has a 1,3,5 code, then push a button. I've been told it's because it has a different type of door jam, who knows.

Well, it's a constant source of frustration for us all because it doesn't work very well and you often have to repeat the code often. We used to get away with propping it open at night, but had to be sure to close it by 4 AM before that nazi housekeeping tattletale lady came. The supervisors tolerated that, except for Vickie, who is more anal. (this is a small rural hospital, BTW)

Yesterday evening I stuffed a glove covered by tape into the door jam. It worked well, but Janet, the annoying CNA started complaining, saying it was illegal, and I think she was the one who quietly removed it. Boy, does she get on her high horse, which is especially irritating because, well, she's not the sharpest tool in the shed, to tell you the honest truth. Anyways, I put the glove back in. We were extremely busy, of course.

The way I see it, the chances of an outsider marching into that med room and breaking into the narc drawer is highly remote. I think that door harms patient care by imperding the flow of care and annoying the staff. To me that door is a symbol of all that's wrong with healthcare today. Now I hear they will be doing QA on the stupid malfuntioning door at night. But, do they bother to fix the darned thing to work properly? NO, of course not, that would be too logical.

[Jetman]

Your facility needs the pyxis system. No locked doors and very easy access to all the meds we use in the ER.

Jetman

[meownsmile, BSN, RN]

I guess we are lucky and only have narcs locked in the back of our med carts. I think in your case though i would take a stack of incident reports and set them handliy next to or in the med room and write one up with the time each and every time someone tried to get in and couldnt get the lockset to work properly. They find a stack of those on their desk and they HAVE to address it. It wouldnt take long from what your post sounds.

[Mystery5]

I got a nice response from my manager. I have a great rapport with her and am not worried at all about what I put in writing. I work at a very healthy place without a lot of shenanagens. She's going to look into getting it fixed.

Regarding the Picus, I worked at a place that had those. They are a worse pain in the neck than that door and a locked drawer, IMO. Plus, I love doing the narc count. It's a precious time with my fellow nurses. We really share some good times, confidences, and workplace news while doing it.

We don't have med carts, we have nurse servers where I work. They are outside the pt rooms and have all the meds there except the narcs. I love the nurse servers, they are another great thing about my workplace!