Let's talk about bad nurses
Not like the “oh they’re just burnt out and need a break.” But the “oh you tied a mentally ill man to a chair for twelve hours because you were tired of dealing with him”. The “oh you’re leaving me with the keys to the med cart so you can do meth in the alley, then come work the rest of your shift”. The “oh you’re on coke because you moonlight at the hospital but want more money to fuel your habit, so you work days too”. The “oh I steal dementia patients pain meds so I can make cash on the side.”
THOSE nurses. The ones you trust (why would you not?) to take care of your mom, dad, sister, grandma. Because it’s “a calling” to be in health care (I assure you, it isn’t for 99% of us)? Because you have some innate sense for caring for those most vulnerable?
No. These are the ones they write articles about that get turned into docuseries or dramatized versions on Netflix. These are the nurses who were the mean girls in high school disguised under scrubs. These are the power trippers, the sycophants and the deceivers.
I don’t know how many times in my 11 years in health care when I’ve seen nurses not count respirations, copy/paste vitals from last week, give the wrong patient medication they should have given the one before them in med pass. I’ve called the cops on my own coworkers because I have proof of abuse, neglect on camera, verbal statements from other residents.
And for what? In theory, you went to school for 1-4 years, took the NCLEX, then either continued on working to get your masters in nursing or went into working in very high acuity, high stress positions in ICUs, medsurg, geriatrics, etc. You squandered your knowledge or outright abused your knowledge of how medicine works to what? Hurt the elderly? Prolong suffering? Feed your own drug habit?
I’ve only seen one nurse in 11 years actually go to jail and get their license revoked. This was 11 years ago. The ones who were caught on camera weren’t turned in by admistration due to staffing shortages and “they’ve just been under so much stress.” I had a director of nursing say in response to my valid complaints, “there’s a reason they call these NURSE-ing homes.”
So what is there to do? Escalate, escalate, escalate. Be the squeaky wheel. Make them feel shame, if they are capable of it. Call the cops but call the ombudsman (a government employee who investigates and tries to resolve complaints), call the state board. Have their NPI number ready and dates/times as soon as they occur. Hell, call the local news station, sue the facility - I encouraged a family to do that once and they did. It’s highly damaging, yes.
But wouldn’t you want someone to do that for you when you couldn’t do it yourself?
