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:
" 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?" |
This message was obviously sent out before they voted Pluto out of the Solar system. We'll send that correction right out.
4 comments:
God, I am so glad I don't have a job where I have to call patients that aren't happy with their perfectly good, perfectly correct care!
I puzzling over three things:
1) How do you give a discount to people who likely won't pay anything anyways? Send them a check?
2) How do you call someone who, eleven times out of ten, has given a bogus or disconnected contact number, or the phone number of their only relative with no Englsh skills, who denies all knowledge of their existence?
3) How would one go about sending a letter, thanking the Douche Family for NOT recommending one's facility to all their indigent, drug-seeking, deadbeat friends and relations? And is it ethical to send along a helpful map of the other facilities nearby that they might, in future, favor with their patronage instead?
Mantra: "It just doesn't matter". "It just doesn't matter". "It just doesn't matter". "It just doesn't matter"
Once, at four in the morning, a family threatened, cajoled, yelled, screamed, tossed chairs, threw some pretty spicy epithets my way, and even accused me of unethical conduct because I wouldn’t let them see the body of their murdered child. And I was on my own time when this took place. After taking this beating for a couple of hours, I finally lost my cool. I could no longer bite my tongue, and my empathy had long since left the room. Try as I could to get it back, I couldn’t, and my ability to even fake empathy finally wore out. The accusations and implications finally got to me.
“You can’t see the body because the body is evidence. Your son is evidence. No one can touch the evidence. No one can kiss the evidence. No one can hug the evidence, like I know you will do. And there is nothing I can do about it. He’s evidence and I have no control over evidence.”
I had been nice and empathetic for almost six hours, four of those uncompensated. I should have been home in bed for those hours. But nice hadn’t worked with that family. My empathy, and it was initially genuine, never got any traction with them. The longer I tried, the angrier they got. I understand that. I’d had it happen before and I got through it. But this time, it just went on for too long and became far too personal, and I lost it.
I explained all of this to my boss when the complaint letter arrived a few of weeks later.
I thought, maybe next time I won’t even try. I’ll make the family show me first that they deserved my efforts and my empathy. And if they don’t, then I’m going home to bed. If they think that I’m insensitive. let them try dealing with the charge nurse next time.
She’ll be insensitive from the get go, especially if family members are rude to her. No second chances. No extra mile. Complaint letters would just roll off her back with the knowledge that it is all but impossible to replace a good night shift charge nurse.
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