What would you do?

[cowgurl89]

So here's the back story....one of the nurses on the unit went into respiratory distress. She was yelling and screaming for oxygen and a nebulizer treatment no one did anything except call 911. The supervisor stated that he did not want to lose his license and the administrator said it was against the facility policy to give any type of treatment. The nurse died on the unit before the ambulance came. What would you have done in this situation? Would you have risked your license if you believed that you could have possibly saved the nurses life?

[Guest219794]

I assume this is a made up hypothetical?

Could you cite some cases in which a nurse loses a license for this sort of thing?

There is, around here, a belief thany any sort of infraction will result in loss of license.

[xoemmylouox, ASN, RN]

Uhhh... Yeah I would have started CPR if she was in the need.

[JBudd, MSN]

If she had enough air to yell and scream............

No one is going to lose their license for hooking up 02, or most especially for doing CPR.

Methinks I smell troll......

[chrisrn24]

Hmm interesting.

I would probably take her pulse ox and if it was low obviously apply o2. But I wouldn't put a neb on.

Did she have a prior history of respiratory distress? If she did she should've carried something for it (neb, inhaler, etc.) if she had a neb in her pocket I would've put it on then.

[BrandonLPN, LPN]

1) if she was yelling, then she was breathing

2) didn't she carry an epi pen or a rescue inhaler for...... whatever..... was going on with her?

3) once she stopped breathing and was without pulse, I'm skeptical that staff wouldn't initiate CPR

[NurseOnAMotorcycle, ASN, RN]

So here's the back story....one of the nurses on the unit went into respiratory distress. She was yelling and screaming for oxygen and a nebulizer treatment no one did anything except call 911. The supervisor stated that he did not want to lose his license and the administrator said it was against the facility policy to give any type of treatment. The nurse died on the unit before the ambulance came. What would you have done in this situation? Would you have risked your license if you believed that you could have possibly saved the nurses life?

On the unit? Which unit? That implies she's in a hospital. She would have been wheeled to the ER and treated. Other than that, I agree that yelling and screaming demands constitutes an adequate airway. This story has too many holes in it. Do they have medical personnel or just "caregivers"? They are CNA level people who are only certified to do CPR in emergency cases and not much else. I don't know what constitutes an administrator.

[netglow, ASN, RN]

Homework, eithics class.

[edmia, BSN, RN]

Sounds like an ethics class homework assignments to me...

If this was real, people would have acted. Or rushed her to the ED since she's in a "unit".

Sent from my iPhone using allnurses.com

[BrandonLPN, LPN]

The fact that they called for an ambulance leads me to believe it couldn't have happened in a hospital.... if it happened at all.

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

OP I see that you have a masters and are not a NP and you are perusing your DNP. Most definitely a homework assignment......OP we are happy to help but we would like for you to start the dialog.

Food for thought......If you are in any facility anyone including visitors can have a code blue called. ANYONE that can scream...has air exchange

[stephanie.]

I think y'all are reading too far into the question. Would you do nothing in fear I losing your license or help at whatever risk?

If you want to get hypothetical, we all know that just because she could scream for help doesn't mean that over the course of a few minutes her condition couldn't worsen. No one knows what brought this "attack" on or what the nurses history is.

Anyway, I would would help and risk losing my license.