What grinds your gears about your coworkers?

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I absolutely HATE it when a pt is NPO and my coworkers document "0" as the oral intake labeled "NPO". Seriously? Just unnecessary.

What grinds your gears?

Specializes in Addictions, Adult Psych.

I might chart 0 even if a patient is NPO because it shows that you checked, and also I don't like to leave anything empty while charting. I doubt my coworkers would do any such thing, but just as a "CYA" practice I don't want to leave room for anyone to falsely chart something under my signature. Also, my facility is still all paper charting so it could be easy to do.

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When co-workers use every little bit of down time they get to gossip or complain about how much of a "bad night" they've been having. or how one resident was "acting crazy" all night. Like they had to deal with the resident all on their own when they didn't. When a lifer constantly talks about how "this place is going down the tubes, BUT they're STILL WORKING THERE!! HAHAHA!! I just find it so funny when a person life is so lame that all they have to talk about is all negativity. I stay away from those miserable people.

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Specializes in ICU.

Here's one from today: RN gives report to myself and the LVN that I am covering. I'm checking orders to see what has been done and hasn't been done. I know for a fact, this pt was not here last night because I knew who was in the room. There is an MRSA swab needed and hasn't been collected. I asked him why it hasn't been collected. His response? "That's from two nights ago." :banghead:

I don't understand that logic! The pt still needs the swab. What if he's positive and two nurses before me haven't been gowning up around him? My LVN collected it. RN reporting off didn't even offer to do it before he left. :sniff:

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I like the question.

I've had great working relationships over the years and tend to give the majority a pass, as they do me. I'll take the bad with the good for the most part. So, it's fun to kvetch a bit.

I don't like laziness, people who shush me (I'm LOUD) lying in report and people who order out food or do the lottery without me.

I don't work with other nurses anymore, being a school nurse. It's one of the worst things about the job, and something I didn't fully think out before changing positions. I miss all my girls (and guys) desperately. You all are my nurses now.

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Specializes in ICU.
I'm a night shifter too, and when all the A&O's get left for me to bathe, it gets me pretty upset, mostly because I know I'm going to get crap in the morning about why more baths weren't done. A&O people want to bathe in the daytime and usually refuse when I ask or try.

When I worked in the hospital the rules clearly stated that the confused and less responsive patients were to be bathed on night shift. One thing where they showed some common sense.

My last hospital had rules that made sense, too - the vented patients got bathed at night and the non-vented ones got bathed during the day. Sure, if you had two vents at night it meant you had two baths, or if the day shift had two non-vented they had two baths, but I still say that makes a heck of a lot more sense than just saying well, one of the patients has to be a day bath and the other has to be a night bath, with no rules about which patient is which.

I always ask if my coworker is going to be back in the morning, and if that nurse says no, I will just go ahead and re-bathe the vented patient and only do foley/peri care on the non-vented one to get them on the schedule I think they should be on. So, I guess some of my A&O patients end up with stinky pits. Oh well.

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Lazy techs, that take 8 years to do a delegated task while sitting at the nurses station chatting it up and on IG and facebook.

Nurses who sit around while their fellow coworkers are drowning.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Med-Surg, Psych, Geri, LTC, Tele,.
...I'm checking orders to see what has been done and hasn't been done....There is an MRSA swab needed and hasn't been collected. I asked him why it hasn't been collected. His response? "That's from two nights ago." :banghead:

I don't understand that logic! The pt still needs the swab. What if he's positive ...:

This is the type of stuff I'm talking about. It's so very frustrating when it happens over and over again with no remorse. It would be one thing if the co worker said they didn't know or they accidentally missed it, but, this non-sensical buck passing...Arrrrghhh!!

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Specializes in Cardiac.

I don't like when a coworker interrupts me with something completely off topic in report:

Pt is in sinus tach and when his QT lengthens he starts having several pvcs then will go into VT. I shocked him 3 times last nigh....."so are you using desitin or repair paste on his butt?"

That happened.

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Specializes in Short Term/Skilled.
OP-- I will often document zero under I&O if a patient did not go to the bathroom. This is especially true for diapered patients. It shows I checked their diaper (hygiene needs) and it was dry (I&O). I will also chart "checked diaper, dry" under hygiene to show I didn't just let them sit in it for two more hours.

I do not agree that you should be required to chart 0 PO intake for someone who is NPO. That seems to be insulting to the intelligence of the nurse.

While we're on the subject, I loathe the word "diaper" unless we're talking about babies.

I just find it so incredibly demeaning, I was always taught to say "brief".

I'm not trying to pick on you or anything, I just figured I'd point it out since the thread is about pet peeves. ;-)

PS, If you nurse babies, I retract my statement ;-)

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Specializes in retired LTC.
...

2. When people copy the previous assessment without actually checking the patient and incorrect information is charted for 5 shifts in a row before I come along and chart reality.

And don't you just love it when they've been charting something in error. Like left arm should have been right arm or O2 at 3L when should have been 2L.

And turtle - do you work NOC? Don't you know NOC gets the specimens? (sarcastic here)

Doesn't matter that we DON'T do big wound dressings - it would just kill them to realize that little bit of info. That grinds my gears- seems like a significant delay in care is OK for them.

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-When there's a discrepancy count on a shift that you didn't work and they want you to tell them what happened?...Um, I wasn't there. The count was correct when the 7pm med tech counted with me and it's off when she counted with the next 7am nurse....I left at 7pm the day before and the count was signed off....what the heck does this have to do with me? Why do I need to come in on my day off? And bring my toddler with me because I don't work during the week? Do you want a drug test? No. Well I do! Actually, never mind, "I quit". They later found the pill popped in the bin outside its card...I still quit.

-When they tell me the patient had a good night and I walk in to a very cold Code Blue.

-When the only report I get on a written report is "IV reseal" and the last shift have disappeared 30 minutes before their shift is over-want to elaborate?

-nurses that complain about other nurses not being able to show up on time yet constantly call saying they will be at least a half hour late because "their alarm didn't go off".

-Honestly, we could complain all day about what we don't like about our coworkers. We just need to learn to appreciate that the majority of them went into nursing for the right reasons (with the exception of the cold code) and sometimes need some guidance. Nobody's perfect and everybody is different. We just have to decide which quirks we can live with and which one's we can't and make our decisions about what to do about the things that matter. Patient's safety, comfort and well being are the things that have to be addressed and cannot be ignored. If someone is sleeping on their shift, it cannot be simply overlooked. Someone will end up hurt or worse if it hasn't happened already.

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And don't you just love it when they've been charting something in error. Like left arm should have been right arm or O2 at 3L when should have been 2L.

And turtle - do you work NOC? Don't you know NOC gets the specimens? (sarcastic here)

Doesn't matter that we DON'T do big wound dressings - it would just kill them to realize that little bit of info. That grinds my gears- seems like a significant delay in care is OK for them.

My favorite is when they not only chart the same incorrect assessment as before but chart about medical devices that the patient doesn't even have like Chest and NG tubes...that were never there! And we wonder why so many people are scared to death of hospitals.

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