You don't have time to do that

One of the things that sparked off my anger when I was new on the wing is when I would go to wash someone's face or give them a drink and other things that are

part of good care and someone would show up and say, "you don't have time to do that."

This phrase is so offensive when some of these things only take a minute. Usually, the ones saying it just show up in the doorway and they are very authoritative.

In one place that I worked, they never used this phrase at all, even when I did everything I could for my patients and it took me until 10:30 at night to get done taking care of them. The most any charge nurse ever asked me is, "Why did it take you so long," and they backed off and left me alone when I told them, "I did complete care on all of them."

It used to drive me nuts as a new nurse when a co worker (usually another nurse sitting at the nsg station) when I would do something simple like that - something the patient needed and couldn't get up and do it themselves. Brought it home when I was a patient myself.

Anne, RNC