I've been SO exhausted lately! There are times where I know that I was meant to be a nurse, there's nothing I would rather be, and I feel that my job is SO rewarding!!!
.....and then there is this week. There seems to be a very large influx of patients and family members that are extremely rude and demanding!
I'm looking for help before I get burned out! There are a lot of things that patients sometimes say, such as "hurry up, you people aren't helping me (when you've been running around all night, cleaning them up every hour), etc..." I TOTALLY understand that these patients are probably having the worst day of their lives and I would never in a million years trade places with them, but I can't help but to take it personally sometimes.
Can you give me some advice on how to diffuse or deflect these types of comments? Maybe some good ways of handling some of the more rude comments that you've been handed? They don't have to be the ones I mentioned above, because I'm sure whatever you've heard, I have heard or will hear too.
i work in ICU and a lot of patients and their families are just mad. Theyre mad at the world because of this situation and they can at times say a lot of rude and horrible things to me.
But also, a lot of patients and families can be SO thankful for you that it just makes you forget all the other horrible things you've been told that day.
Down through the years there have been so many "rude" and crude remarks that they have all melded into one big morass of scar covered insults.
But my significant other, who is also a nurse, said, when I posed this question to her, that she was also at a loss to remember but then remembered and said, nonchalantly, "I'm sure it had something to do with being called a white honky *****." Oh yeah!!!
I have actually had instances where patients have made rude comments one minute, only to thank me a few minutes later. I remember working with an elderly man who said something along the lines of, "God, you're a dummy! Are you sure you're a nurse?" and then five minutes later, after getting him tucked into bed, and giving him all his meds, he said "Thank you so much for all your help"
In the hospital, I remember one patient asking me what my father did. When I told him that he worked with computers, that patient's response was, "No wonder you're so effed (only he used the actual word) up!"
Another time, I was trying to perform a test on a patient who had her dog with her and refused to move or let anyone else hold her dog. The dog got snappy with me, and almost bit me. When the PCA offered to hold the dog while I did the procedure, the patient's response was, "If she gets bit, she gets bit."
Although it is hard, I try to remind myself that these patients are not feeling like themselves and that if they were, they would not be making these remarks. I remind myself that they have some sort of illness affecting their judgment. In the case of the dog, I really was not happy, because my own safety was at risk, but I tried to convince myself that the dog was providing comfort to the patient and if the dog was not there, I may not be able to help the patient at all.
Specializes in Public Health, Maternal Child Health.
Omg! I am so sorry that happened to you! How awful. Wish I could apologize on behalf of all white people. You are so right to say that life is too short to be bothered by those comments. It's still heartbreaking tho.
I was doing bloodwork on a male patient and said "this will be quick". He yelled out "oh good a quickie. I can't wait for my happy ending". I couldn't help but say "are you freaking kidding me?" I know that was wrong on my behalf, but I wasn't going to be spoken to like that. I removed the tourniquet, the needle and walked out of the room. I refused to care for him the rest of the shift. He told another staff member he was joking and thought I would like to hear that due to being "pretty". Being propositioned like a prostitute is so endearing!
Yesterday I had a strange situation with patient's "friends" in her room. I went to introduce myself, and on of them told me not to come back until I find out what's on the menu for dinner. Okay, so I did, got the meds, come back in. They quiz me on different things, then one asks where I was from, I said town so-and-so, but they heard some accent I guess, so had to tell them I was out of country ( I avoid this usually). The asked me if I went to school there, and I did high school there, college in the USA. Another one said : "I can't believe they let them graduate college here!" I was very upset after that, and asked her directly where SHE went to college. Turned out she didn't; are you f** serious?
What's the rudest thing that's been said to me by a patient or family?
A patient called me a black ___ (rhymes with 'witch,' but starts with 'B') and told me to "go back to Africa." I told him I was born and raised in the US, as well as the preceding six generations of my family.
I also ended the interaction and turned his care over to another nurse who belonged to the same racial group as him. Life is too short to deal with people who stereotype me and do not want me around.
I think you handled that wonderfully and I hope that one day I would be able to handle situations like this when I become a nurse.
Yesterday I had a strange situation with patient's "friends" in her room. I went to introduce myself, and on of them told me not to come back until I find out what's on the menu for dinner. Okay, so I did, got the meds, come back in. They quiz me on different things, then one asks where I was from, I said town so-and-so, but they heard some accent I guess, so had to tell them I was out of country ( I avoid this usually). The asked me if I went to school there, and I did high school there, college in the USA. Another one said : "I can't believe they let them graduate college here!" I was very upset after that, and asked her directly where SHE went to college. Turned out she didn't; are you f** serious?
Well clearly you got a better education then me in high school because public schools here in the US are not the greatest.
I've had patients in the ER with the worst veins ever, dialysis, chemo, etc. I had a pt call her family and say "I need another nurse this one doesn't know what the hell she is doing!" when her vein blew on the first stick. I knew I could do it but I decided to call a 16 year veteran to do it cause she wasn't going to be happy any other way. Sometimes you have to pretend you are teflon and let the rude comments slide ride off you.
A patient called me a black ___ (rhymes with 'witch,' but starts with 'B') and told me to "go back to Africa." I told him I was born and raised in the US, as well as the preceding six generations of my family.
What the hell is wrong with people?
Oh it's everywhere. And it's worse with the riff raff I see in my ER.
BSN16
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i work in ICU and a lot of patients and their families are just mad. Theyre mad at the world because of this situation and they can at times say a lot of rude and horrible things to me.
But also, a lot of patients and families can be SO thankful for you that it just makes you forget all the other horrible things you've been told that day.