We have been slowly decreasing triage out front. Days past we could have up to three nurses out front but not anymore. Now days we have one sitting at the desk with two techs who run patients back. The nurse out front types the chief complaint in and places them in a bed in the back. Rarely are they triaged out front anymore. So, our illustrious Dr. Silverfox has made comments that he would like to completely close triage in the near future.
One day a few weeks ago one of the charges decided to not even recept the patients coming in the door. Just grab them and place them in any available bed. The nurse in the back was now responsible for recepting and then triaging the patient. It makes the door to bed time almost nil but is it safe?
If I'm in a cardiac room and 2 or 3 patients show up in my other rooms I won't know it because they aren't on the tracker yet. Of course nobody tells you they just placed patients in your rooms, you're suppose to know this by freaking osmosis I suppose. Of course we still have 3 or 4 charge nurses on who are sitting at the desk with their feet up and surfing the net.
The door to bed thing has gotten out of control. Of course all the upper management types are getting big bonuses and visits from the corporate hacks praising them for their great wait times.
FML.
7 comments:
that is so sad... :(
You might want to consider retiring before the stress of the situation kills you. :( Is that possible?
It probably would help if the charges would get off their butts...
This is the trend across the country. Here's the thing: there is a reason for TRIAGE in ERs: the sickest go back FIRST. With this everybody goes back right away, sometimes things are not what they appear. So you are in the room of one of the two patients that came in and the other patient is worse off than anybody realized. Thats the danger.
Here is the thing: All these changes are happening to increase satisfaction scores with little input from the nurses who actually care for the patients. Eventually this shit is gonna bite them in the butt.
Saying you need to retire is a little harsh...you are merely expressinghe frustration all of us feel.
But when we are at the age of retirement....isn't that an option?
Why kill ourselves in a broken system that has no hope of getting better, especially if we have great options?
Nothing wrong in leaving it all and retiring and actually enjoying ourselves 100% of the time!
This is very ironic and quite sarcastic. Ah, sarcasm in a way is a sign of protest to a situation that shows injustice and not right.
Take care,
Peny@cherokee scrubs
What are the odds of someone dying?
If they die, it was no ones fault.
For it to be the hospitals fault, someone has to prove something wrong was done.
If the dead patient/dead patients family can't prove it and go to court with the evidence, then there is no lawsuit.
This remind me of ...
From "The Fight Club" movie
Take the number of vehicles in the field, (A), and multiply it by the probable rate of failure, (B), then multiply the result by the average out-of-court settlement, (C). A times B times C equals X...
If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
BUSISNESS WOMAN: Are there a lot of these kinds of accidents?
JACK: Oh, you wouldn't believe.
BUSINESS WOMAN: Which... car company do you work for?
JACK:A major one.
Yeah, being a nurse sometimes can drown you alive. The only way is to find ways to overcome stress and work it out from there...
Pt. satisfaction is the biggest wagonload of horse cobblers to come down the pike in decades, and it won't stop until they kill a few thousand pts., if then. Because with the improvements in medicine, this nonsense will give trial lawyers a new revenue stream.
We've had a parade of consultants, and then kissass charge nurses who go along with this crapola out of fear of being canned, and the exact problems you cite, we've seen in spades, just short of people dying. But that'll happen too, sure as spring follows winter.
My personal policy is to always find the nurse responsible for the room and give report for the pt. (I just love when the newbs try to cop an attitude at being paid basic courtesy), and when I'm the nurse in a section, if you haven't given me report, it isn't my pt. or my repsonsibility until I either find the pt., or get that report. And when I find, as I have more and more frequently, serious pts. languishing in a back room and not on the tracker, I document "No report given to RN, Pt. X found moaning in Rm XX."
Just because some hospital mgmt. weenie has his head up his back end it isn't going to cost me my license or my job.
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