Due to Budget Constraints, the Light at the End of the Tunnel Has Been Extinguished

It's all about the Benjamins (or in our case, the Georges). My little ER, without any concrete plans except "it's going to happen", is going Urgent Care at some point in the next 3 or 4 months.  I will be out of a job.

No need for critical care nurses in that setting.  Certainly they can get cheaper staff.  Hours of operation will be slashed.  There will be one nurse.  Good bye, lab peeps.  The will only need phlebotomists.  See ya, X-ray techs.  You're losing hours as well.  Congratulations PT you get to keep your jobs.

Stress eating at work has become the new hobby, along with speculation, gallows humor, and the stages of grief.  We sent Beth out for ice cream the other night and she came back with three gallons, along with hot fudge, whipped cream and potato chips.  Screw the ice cream, chips dipped in hot fudge with whipped cream?  DELICIOUS!!!

I have to say that the one silver lining is that my resume is updated annually at tax time, so I am in a better position than some of my colleagues who haven't had one in years.

I'm sad.  I'm not ready to job hunt at age 58.  I can't physically do 12 hour shifts.

My job has become a Death Watch.

Thank You...

...to patient satisfaction surveys and Press Gainey for giving the public the means to bitch when their every wish is not magically granted in the ER.  Too bad Dr. Google doesn't have office hours because THAT is some sound medical practice.  I'm sorry....you didn't get that MRI Dr. Google recommended?  What a shame.  Your best friend's sister's boyfriend the veterinary tech said you needed Percocet for that two week old sore ankle?  Oh pooh.  Your mother convinced you that you needed antibiotics for that cold?  Tsk Tsk.   I want, therefore I will get it.....NOT necessarily.

My boss handed me a survey today with a scathing review of the individual's care.  I was the nurse.
He had punched a wall but lied to me and told me he fell down.  I knew it was bullshit but I generally leave it to the provider to explain why some little knowledge of physics is required in order to fabricate a mechanism of injury.  In other words telling him his story is bullshit.

"I don't want to call him", Jane said.  She is responsible for calling all the bullshit whiners and people who are verbally abusive to staff and squeaky wheels in general in order to make them feel like we deeply regret that their 10/10 pain was not sincerely addressed.  This is in accordance with Bible of Upper Management Bullshit, specifically the Crap According to Clipboarders verse:

'Your wife will become a harlot in the city, your sons and your daughters will fall by the sword, your land will be parceled up' 

oh, sorry, wrong one.  This is it:

" and unto them a discount shall be given"

Accordingly, being less than truthful with minimal outward damage and negative xrays will not garner one an automatic narcotic pain prescription.  So the respondent went home with a prescription for Motrin and was pissed off.

"That Dr. XX was a moron.  All I got was a $150.00 bill and MOTRIN!!  Who goes to the ER and gets Motrin???  I am telling everyone I know that the care SUCKS there.  But the nurse was OK"

I am sure it was waaaaaaaaay more than $150.00.

File this under "Things that will ultimately reveal themselves to be Galactically Stupid ideas.  Sort of like this, which has been bothering me for quite some time:

"Hey, does this solar system make my ass look big?"

Thank you, NASA....for sending this into the solar system and including our address, so that extraterrestrials  might visit us in our naked and unarmed glory with raygunz and sh*t
This message was obviously sent out before they voted Pluto out of the Solar system.  We'll send that correction right out.

You're It

I have decided not to do any more EKG competencies because they are stupid and a waste of time.  Screw that.  This is my last one:

Go Away

I have just had it with the attention whores of the world.  I'm sure you can relate, not just to the ER but to everyday experience.  They are having loud cell phone discussions in the grocery store.  They demand attention with their nonsense.  They have the most pressing problems ever.   They are black holes that suck you right out of your zone and into their chaotic crap.

I went to the salon to have a mani and pedi, something I don't do often enough apparently because the little owner of the shop greeted me by name with a big hug and said it had been a long time.  Well....October to be exact where I used to visit twice a month.

There were a few changes, "Golden Girls" and music videos on their big screen TV had been replaced by X Games.  Cool.  One of the owners son's was looking at knives online.  Slightly disturbing, but OK.

I had settled in enjoying the relative peace and quiet when the inevitable attention whore swept in with her entourage of unkempt children.  She opened by loudly asking how long the wait would be for a manicure for one of her teens like she was one cupcake away from total starvation.  Oh, right away.  She probably could have used a shower more than a manicure I'm thinking.

Then the phone calls started.  Attention Whore spent the next 20 minutes loudly discussing an impending auto purchase on her cell phone.  Names were named, prices were uttered.  She was apparently trading in some shitbox that the dealer wasn't interested in and wasn't that crying shame.

I had started the afternoon with a hope for Serenity Now and concluded it with Murder in My Heart.

Go away, loud lady.

"Hear that?  The fat lady is singing you out of the building"

They were probably relatives of the patient who came in by ambulance with a bug in her ear.  Yes.  A. Bug.  Drama, drama, along with 4 of her equally dramatic and attention seeking family members.  This crap would customarily be, at best, simply a pain in the ass.  Add  2 transfers, a possible ectopic, and a walk in chest pain and you can tell how far down on the list Bug in the ER had fallen.  I kicked them all out with a "you can pick one buddy, everyone else goes to the lobby".  Gil swept in with a curt nod and slammed the door shut for good measure.

"Oh", sniffed a relative, "where we laughing too loud?  It didn't look like it was very busy.

Just to be clear ( NEWSFLASH) if you have to ASK if you are being inappropriate you probably are.  And it isn't worth my valuable time to explain why or make you feel all warm and fuzzy because I just don't feel like it.