The Direct Admit, A Funny Story

oramar

Early one morning I received notification that Dr. So&So was sending a patient, a female to our unit and that the charge nurse had assigned a room for her. The only other information I got was that the woman was a "direct admit", which means that she is coming from the doctor's office thus bypassing the ER.

A little while later someone shouted the town hall that "the direct admission is here", so I stuck my head out of another patient's room to see who and what. The sight that met my eyes was that of a young woman who was slowly making her way down the hall. She was walking very gingerly and looking very uncomfortable.

The young woman had huge bandages on both her feet, I mean they were HUGE and she was supporting her weight on her heels to minimize the discomfort. She was also doing a sort of duck walk with her feet jutting out to the side, hanging on to the rail with one hand and supporting herself on the shoulder of the older woman's with the other. The huge bandages and the duck walk were a comic sight but I was too mortified by the thought that my patient had walked up to my unit in that condition to see the humor of the situation.

As quickly as I could I got a wheelchair and rushed to her side. I practically lifted her into the wheelchair because I was in such a hurry to get her off of her feet. I then charged back to the assigned room with her and began getting her into bed at the same time shoving a hospital gown at her.

At this point, the young woman began protesting and pointing at the older woman saying, "no, no, it's my mom".

I was so focused on getting her off those feet that it took a few seconds for what she was saying to register with me. I had practically picked her up and flung her into the bed. She started pushing me away and waving her hands in the air which finally forced me to pay attention to what she was saying.

The point that she was trying to make was that her mother, that perfectly healthy looking woman who was with her, just happened to be THE PATIENT! I was redfaced and embarrassed about the incident but lucky for me the patient and her daughter thought the whole thing was funny. They could have just as easily been indignant and irate.

I actually wrote an incident report out on myself, the nurse manager giggled the whole time she read it. It was really a learning experience for me and after that, I became hypervigilant about making sure the person I thought was the patient was indeed the patient.

Long before the "time out" technique became the standard for the healthcare industry I was stopping myself and asking, "who, where, what and when is going on here?"

The Direct Admit, A Funny Story

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