if i wasnt so frustrated i would laugh

Nurses New Nurse

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i was taking care of this elderly lady who was nice. the daughter was very demanding and was angry at the doctors and the hospital (she didnt feel the dr's were doing their best). so i get this lady 1900 when i came on. she vomits large amount of brown liquid about 2200. i call the md and tell him. he goes what did i give her for nausea. i said i am telling you first before i give any medications (it was a resident). i was concerned about the color. her abd was firm and distended also. i am thinking bile or possible bowel obstruction. she does fine on the zofran. no further issues of nausea or vomiting.

i get a call from the nurse manager that she told her daughter that she vomited all over her (she made it all in the bucket - i was there the whole time). and she vomited again in the morning. she also told the daughter she was crying out for help and no one came. i came as soon as she rung the call bell. this is the first i had cared for. it is so frustrating because of what she said to her daughter was untrue. i was told the nurse manager the pca was in there with me too.

anyone have this happened. :bugeyes:

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I had a patient last week who had terminal lung cancer (he looked like he was losing the battle) but sadly he seemed to be in the "anger" and "denial" stage of grieving process. He was admitted for nausea/vomitting. Doctors suspected that it was due to his chemotherapy so it was stopped for a week. Predictably, the chemotherapy agent was still in his body after a week and he was still having emesis. He refused Zofran and other anti-emetics because he felt that they there were not doing anything and he "felt like sh*t". During rounds with the doctor (I was present at bedside) - the patient stated "I hate this hospital! And the nurses! Everytime I ring the bell, they come in 10 minutes later and ask me how I am doing and offer me Zofran!" I was surprised by that statement. I thought we were doing our best :/ I also had a lady one time who when being asked if she in pain, looked away from me and said "I am fine!". i should have realized that she wasn't "fine", but it was my first day on the floor after orientation and I had 5 other pts. Later she complained to her daughter and the doctor that she was in pain the whole morning and no one did anything. The doctor pretty much yelled this info at me. I walked back into the room and asked the pt to clarify what's going on, she explained "well, I was being ****** to you, you should have realized that I am in pain!!!!" I just told her that "pain management is an important part of nursing care. that is why we ask our patients frequently if they are in pain and ask them to rate their pain. please share this information with your nurse, as it helps us take better care of your needs. The fact is I don't want to see any of my patients suffering, but I can't also make any assumptions about people's characters. if you are in pain, let me know and when I ask you if you are in pain, let me know, I will be here as soon as possible to help you out." After we established that we had no problems, family was very nice to me for the next 5 days. Sometimes there's lines of communication are not clear, don't take it personally...

p.s. I have also seen a lot of families exaggerate their stories when the doctor was in, as in "he IV was bleeding all over the bed" - when really it was a couple of drops when the tech put an iv in. Or "the nurse took an hour to bring pain medication" - and it was more like 20 minutes - because guess what - you stand in line to get your meds out, and it takes time to count narcotics, and if you have lab calling you about a critical value, yes you have to fill out that sheet right away.

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........

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i am sorry the daughter told the nurse manager this.

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i am sorry the daughter told the nurse manager this.
I just read your post again... my mistake. I can see now what you clearly meant by 'she' --- the patient was telling the daughter these things. Sorry, I misunderstood.

Yeah. It happens. Some patients and families are going to lie and complain about their care. Nothing much you can do about it except document to CYA.

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Specializes in FNP, Peds, Epilepsy, Mgt., Occ. Ed.

It happens to everyone. I had a patient tell a doctor once "I didn't sleep at all, all night long."

She had been up once to the bathroom and went right back to sleep.

What the patient forgot was that she was on a monitoring unit and on camera all night.

The biggest lie, though, left me speechless. I did an annual physical on a female patient. Breast exam, pelvic, the works. I was done and about to leave the room when she said "what about that lump in my breast?" This was the first time she'd mentioned it, including when she was directly asked if she was having any problems.

She looked me dead in the eye and said "You didn't check my breasts!"

I am sure my jaw dropped. I had done a breast exam not five minutes before.

I was dumbfounded and didn't know what to say. I just said "Well, let me check it now" and did; she had a small thickening I had not felt on her exam that I really had done, with her lying down.

Thank God she never came back to see me.

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