Imagine my suprise this weekend when I get to work and find out that new policy is that the RN's will make toast for the pt trays!!!!
Yes, that's right, dietary will only send bread up and we are expected to toast it in the toasters provided to the unit. So now, I have to pick up the tray when it is dropped at the desk, take it to the pts room, take the bread all the way back to the convienetly located toaster (NOT) and bring it back.
I work in AICU, anyone think I really have the time for this malarkey??? I was really frustrated over this one and I told the charge nurse they better get some techs up here if this is what they expect. I can only hear the complaints now..."The nurse didnt make my toast right!"
I'm impressed their willing to spend the money and buy you a toaster! If they decide to add this to our list of responsibilities at my facility we'd be expected to "toast" our bread on the warmer burner of the coffee machine.
We can't have a toaster or even make popcorn in microwaves anymore due to fire alarms being set off!
But honestly I see this as a huge hindrance to nurses to take them from the bedside to do a mundane frilly task that isn't that necessary. If a pt is well enough to complain and be picky about their toast perhaps they're well enough to go home and make themselves.
Another huge issue I have with toast making is the cross contamination. If I understand this right a plate of bread will be taken to the pt room then be brought back out to toast? We all know where those pt hands have been and you know they won't be able to keep those same picky little hands off that bread to check freshness. Then that nasty ol bread will be put in the toaster. What if a pt has mrsa or c-diff? I can see it work if the bread never is touched or taken into the pt rm but really who has time? I think that management should start their day by serving toast to the pts! How about some poached eggs with that toast?!?!
I would really appreciate a poached egg atop my buttered toast please.... and a newspaper. Thank you.
ETA: Ooops I almost forgot, and a large freshly squeezed orange juice too. Thank you.
I can see it now, the nurses make their breakfast rounds. They proceed down the hallway with their special breakfast cart that has breakfast goodies and cooking paraphernalia. Patient in bed one wants poached eggs, so she prepares the eggs to order, and gets the order from the patient in bed two. He wants Eggs Benedict and Eggs Benedict it is! Then on to the next room, mind you she pulls a second cart along behind her that has the special selections for those on restricted diets. That hospital floor must have a pleasant breakfast aroma around 7 am and lots of smiling patients in the morning.
Like one of the previous posters, my hospital has hostesses who can attend to special dietary requests. But I work in a private hospital. I can imagine the reaction if the powers that be tried to bring in that kind of ruling in South African State hospitals....
An EMERGENCY MEETING involving ALL union members would be called within 2 hours of the suggestion being aired. The meeting would open with numerous Freedom Songs being sung and a session of dancing on the spot. The comrades would be informed that all unions would vigorously oppose such treatment, with threats of strike action.
This would be followed up by a bit of placard-waving in front of the hospitals, a march to Parliament to present a letter of protest (anti-toast) to the Minister of Health and some roadside aerobics aka toyi-toying.
Bread delivery trucks would be stopped en route to the hospitals and their contents distributed to the protesters. Eventually it would be discovered that all the toasters had disappeared under mysterious circumstances, the idea would be quietly dropped and the nurses would go back to work, having lost a few kilos in the interim-only to pick them up again from eating too much bread...
Hilarious thread! Keep on toasting-er, I mean posting...
I can see it now, the nurses make their breakfast rounds. They proceed down the hallway with their special breakfast cart that has breakfast goodies and cooking paraphernalia. Patient in bed one wants poached eggs, so she prepares the eggs to order, and gets the order from the patient in bed two. He wants Eggs Benedict and Eggs Benedict it is! Then on to the next room, mind you she pulls a second cart along behind her that has the special selections for those on restricted diets. That hospital floor must have a pleasant breakfast aroma around 7 am and lots of smiling patients in the morning.
I don't know what the kitchen is up to but the smell of cooking hamburger at 4am just doesn't smell right, especially when mingled with the aroma of ostomies and fistulas:barf01:.
Why can't they just make cookies and croissants for the pts to wake up to?
We do have room service and dietary aides to pass trays, help discharge pts, answer call lights during their down time, stock our kitchenettes, make coffee for visitors etc. So I do believe they could make toast if we were allowed to toast our own bread.
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I'm impressed their willing to spend the money and buy you a toaster! If they decide to add this to our list of responsibilities at my facility we'd be expected to "toast" our bread on the warmer burner of the coffee machine.